Five star review, originally posted here on August 29th, 2025:
This was fantastic. An absolutely perfect work of non-fiction. This book is just non-stop animal facts, and they’re all fucking fascinating. It took several days before I broke myself of the habit of contacting my poor husband with constant weird animal facts. “Let me tell you about the shape of dolphin vaginas” or “have you heard about this bug with 2 dicks? But they die as soon as they use a dick, so… WHAT IS THE SECOND DICK FOR????!” This book will make you very popular at parties, because who DOESN’T want to hear about how much Charles Dawin hated his wife? Or about the mating rituals of the sage grouse? Or about various animals with clits so bit they’re used as a penis decoy? Oh my God I just want to go back and read the whole thing over again because I’m already forgetting all these awesome animal facts.
I was especially happy with the narrator. “This lady is great! I am going to look her up and listen to other audiobooks read by her!” But holy cow, guess what? The author read this one herself! She was so good, I honestly assumed she was a paid actor. Her excitement for her material shines through, and she does a bang-up job getting the reader just as pumped as she is.
I’m putting Lucy Cooke right up there with Mary Roach and Bill Bryson as a master of informing while entertaining. Bravo. Six out of five stars.
Helga without the H 