* Lucy Cooke - The Truth About Sloths and Other Animals (4 books)

LUCY COOKE (b. 1969/1970) is a British zoologist, author, television producer, director, and presenter.  She has presented a range of natural history programmes for the BBC.

Cooke is the author of THE TRUTH ABOUT ANIMALS: STONED SLOTHS, LOVELORN HIPPOS, AND OTHER TALES FROM THE WILD SIDE OF WILDLIFE (2007), which investigates popular misconceptions about animals, including sloths, hyenas, penguins, and pandas.  She takes us on a worldwide journey to meet everyone from a Colombian hippo castrator to a Chinese panda porn peddler, all to lay bare the secret — and often hilarious — habits of the animal kingdom.  Charming and at times downright weird, this modern bestiary is perfect for anyone who has ever suspected that virtue might be unnatural.

She had previously written about sloths in A LITTLE BOOK OF SLOTH (2013), a heart-melting photographic picture book starring the laziest — and one of the cutest — animals on the planet, as well as LIFE IN THE SLOTH LANE: SLOW DOWN AND SMELL THE HIBISCUS (2018).  It will come as no surprise that Cooke is also the founder of the Sloth Appreciation Society.

Her most recent book, BITCH: ON THE FEMALE OF THE SPECIES (2022), shows us a new evolutionary biology, one where females can be as dynamic as any male.  Cooke charts the rising influence of feminism on the 'phallocracy’'of evolutionary biology over the past several decades, arguing for the power of more recent female-led science to, for example, reframe core beliefs about sexual selection, maternal instinct and self-sacrifice, and proclivities for monogamy or nymphomania.  In doing so, she introduces us to a marvelous zoetrope of animals — not just primates, but venomous intersex moles, hyenas that give birth through their clitoris, filicidal mother meerkats, and postmenopausal orcas.

Be sure to check out Cooke's recent interview on 60 Minutes (aired 24 Sept. 2023, available on YouTube).


The following books are in ePub or PDF format as indicated:

* A Little Book of Sloth (McElderry Books, 2013) – PDF

* Bitch: On the Female of the Species (Basic Books, 2022) – ePub

* Life in the Sloth Lane: Slow Down and Smell the Hibiscus (Workman, 2018) – ePub

* The Truth About Animals: Stoned Sloths, Lovelorn Hippos, and Other Tales from the Wild Side of Wildlife (Basic Books, 2018) – ePub


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