Bitch: A Revolutionary Guide to Sex, Evolution and the Female Animal

'A dazzling, funny and elegantly angry demolition of our preconceptions about female behaviour and sex in the animal kingdom ... Bitch is a blast. I read it, my jaw sagging in astonishment, jotting down favourite parts to send to friends and reading out snippets gleefully...' Observer 'A book that is tearing down the stereotypes and the biases. Absolutely fascinating.' BBC R4 Woman's Hour 'From the heir to Attenborough. 5*' - Telegraph 'Glorious ... A bold and gripping takedown of the sexist mythology baked into biology ... Full of marvellous surprises. Guardian 'Colourful, committed and deeply informed.' Sunday Times 'Gloriously original' Daily Mirror A 'sparkling attack on scientific sexism' Nature 'Humorous, absorbing, sometimes shocking (for a variety of reasons), and bound to be a conversation starter' BBC Wildlife 'Brilliant ... Cooke is a superb science writer' TLS 'Zoologist Lucy Cooke's hilarious and enlightening book reclaims evolutionary biology for females of all species.' New Statesman 'Introduces us to a marvelous zoetrope of animals.' The Atlantic '[An] effervescent exposé ... [A] playful, enlightening tour of the vanguard of evolutionary biology.' Scientific American Selected for the Telegraph's 'best books for summer 2022' and as one of the Guardian's '50 hottest new books for a great escape'. _______________________________________________________________ What does it mean to be female? Mother, carer, the weaker sex? Think again. In the last few decades a revolution has been brewing in zoology and evolutionary biology. Lucy Cooke introduces us to a riotous cast of animals, and the scientists studying them, that are redefining the female of the species. Meet the female lemurs of Madagascar, our ancient primate cousins that dominate the males of their species physically and politically. Or female albatross couples, hooking up together to raise their chicks in Hawaii. Or the meerkat mothers of the Kalahari Desert - the most murderous mammals on the planet. The bitches in BITCH overturn outdated binary expectations of bodies, brains, biology and behaviour. Lucy Cooke's brilliant new book will change how you think - about sex, sexual identity and sexuality in animals and also the very forces that shape evolution. __________ Praise for Lucy's previous book THE UNEXPECTED TRUTH ABOUT ANIMALS 'Endlessly fascinating' - Bill Bryson 'I cannot remember when I enjoyed a non-fiction book so much' - Daily Express 'A joy from beginning to end' - Guardian 'Best science pick: deeply researched, sassily written' - Nature

About the Author :
Lucy Cooke is a fellow of Durham University, a National Geographic explorer, TED talker and award-winning broadcaster with a Masters in zoology from New College Oxford, where she studied under Richard Dawkins. Her first book A Little Book of Sloth was a New York Times bestseller and spawned a major TV series for Discovery and a BBC Radio 4 documentary. The Truth About Animals, her first long-form book was shortlisted for the Royal Society prize and has been translated into nineteen languages. Her most recent book, Bitch: What Does it Mean to be Female? was cited as one of the best books of the year by both the Telegraph and the Guardian and was adapted into the BBC Radio 4 series, Political Animals. She is a columnist for BBC Wildlife Magazine and has also written for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, the Guardian, The Times, Telegraph and New Scientist amongst other publications. She is a sought-after public speaker and has written, produced, and presented documentaries for the BBC, Channel 4, National Geographic, Animal Planet and Discovery. She has presented on the BBC’s ‘Springwatch’ and is a regular on BBC Radio 4.

Review :
Surprising sex lives of the animal kingdom: From bondage-loving spiders to 'Scrooge-like' lobsters who save their sperm for a female who's 'worth it', BITCH lifts the lid on kinky creatures Best books of 2022 so far: Zoologist Lucy Cooke's hilarious and enlightening book reclaims evolutionary biology for females of all species. Mr Darwin, your time is up...This is the evolutionary reboot us bitches have been waiting for. Brilliant ... Cooke is a superb science writer Beautifully written, very funny and deeply important - Lucy Cooke blows two centuries of sexist myths right out of biology. A complete and precise exploration of sex , what a joy! Fun, informative and revolutionary all at once, Bitch should be required reading in school. This is a joyous, and often hilarious, romp in which Cooke simultaneously does justice to the actual data, gives voice to the substantive contributions of women scientists, and demolishes bias, blindness and ignorance about sex in the academy and in the public. After reading this book one will never look at a clownfish, a barnacle, an orca, an albatross or a human the same way again. And the world will be better for it. Lucy Cooke's marvellous Bitch blasts the dust off stuffy old ideas to celebrate the true and wildly diverse influence of femal creatures throughout the animal kingdom, revealing them to be every bit as promiscuous, competitive, aggressive and dynamic as males ... In chapters fizzing with X-rated factoids, Cooke merrily demolishes myth after myth about our wild sisters ... Never mean or boring. It's exhilarating to zip through the world with her as she points out what has been missed or misinterpreted. A colourful, committed and deeply informed book. A dazzling, funny and elegantly angry demolition of our preconceptions about female behaviour and sex in the animal kingdom ... Bitch is a blast. I read it, my jaw sagging in astonishment, jotting down favourite parts to send to friends and reading out snippets gleefully