Book Reviews

Being a Beast

“Intensely strange and terrifically vivid . . . An eccentric modern classic of nature writing.” ―Dwight Garner, The New York Times

“Spectacularly unconventional . . . A meditative romp that leaves you laughing out loud (and occasionally cursing in anger), even as you soak up the spray of science . . . Steeped in scholarship yet directed by his own quirky mysticism, Foster brilliantly takes on questions of animal consciousness, cognition, emotion, and theory of mind.” ―The New York Times Book Review

“A tour de force of modern nature writing . . . that shows us how to better love the world beyond ourselves.” ―The Guardian (London)

“A blend of memoir, neuroscience and nature writing . . . that pushes zoological obsession to even greater heights―and depths.” ―The Wall Street Journal

“Gonzo nature writing . . . Extremely entertaining.” ―The New York Review of Books

“An embed with the animals . . . Foster’s quirky book shows how emulating animals not only helps our understanding of them―it makes us more human.” ―People

“Foster wants to be the wild thing, living as wild things live. In Being a Beast, he nearly convinces us that such shape-shifting is possible in the way he lyrically tells his stories―uncensored, intensely descriptive and often hysterical.” ―Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

“Extraordinary, hair-raising, and deliberately funny . . . Atrophied senses limit our lived experiences. Be a beast, says Foster, to become a better human.” ―Maclean’s

“A splendid, vivid contribution to the literature of nature . . . Daringly imaginative . . . There’s not an ounce of sentimentality in any of it, but instead good science and hard-nosed thought. Furthermore, Foster has the gift of poetry.” ―Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

“A fascinating exploration . . . His attempts to actually be a beast make this a different sort of wildlife book. . . . Ultimately, Foster found reciprocity in his unusual and daring immersion in nature, feeling that he now knows the essence of animals’ lives and is somehow newly known in return.” ―Booklist (starred review)

“Woven through the lyrical narrative are neuroscience, facts about the creatures, and philosophy. . . . This book’s fascinating premise, with its unique perspective of how animals perceive their surroundings, will be of interest to scientists, naturalists, and those who enjoy reading about natural history.” ―Library Journal

“An extraordinary account . . . In lesser hands this could come off as trite or patronizing, but Foster is quick to acknowledge his shortcomings and errors in perspective regarding his project, and he projects a healthy sense of humor. . . . This approach, along with his willingness to address and avoid the temptation for anthropomorphism, makes his book interesting and informative.” ―Publishers Weekly

“When it comes to wilderness porn, it’s going to be very hard to beat Being a Beast.” ―London Evening Standard

“Being a Beast is a strange kind of masterpiece: the song of a satyr, perhaps, or nature writing as extreme sport. Foster marks out the distance between us and the beasts in a way that helps sharpen their boundaries and ours―and ours are not always where we think.” ―Financial Times

“This year’s H is for Hawk, the book leaves you feeling that perhaps Helen MacDonald’s bestseller might have been improved if she had only tried to fly.” ―World Travel Guide

“An extraordinary book.” ―Sunday Times (UK)

“Living like an animal in order to write about it sounds like a gimmick. It isn’t. Groundbreaking? Definitely.” ―The Scotsman

“A highly original attempt to break free from the anthropocentrism that often characterizes nature writing . . . A rich, joyful, and inspiring book.” ―The Independent (UK)

Being a Human

“Dazzling and eccentric . . . Foster is a beautiful writer and an engaging companion throughout this strange, occasionally maddening book. The argument―that we as a species have lost something in our move from wandering animism to settled civilisation―is a powerful one, amply supported by learned quotations and dense footnotes . . . A wonderfully fun if entirely bonkers read.”
―The Guardian

“Being a Human, like Being a Beast, the (also extraordinary) book that preceded it, is both a learned treatise and a kind of visionary journalism; it reports back from the edges of our cramped consciousness . . . In search of who we are, pursuing his own brand of gonzo neurobiology, Foster flings himself physically into various inhospitable corners of the English countryside, depriving himself of everyday comforts that his perceptions may be cleansed. And so they are.”
―The Atlantic

“Foster is a writer of extraordinary ability. His descriptions of nature dazzle . . . Being a Human [is] a lesson in what to watch for in nature. It’s a discourse on the sentience we may have had as early humans and that, over millennia, we’ve somehow roasted into a crisp. It’s funny. It’s moving. It’s mind-expanding. It’s a collection of thoughts to read again and again.”
―Forbes

“A truly wonderful book . . . in the literal sense of the phrase. A book of wonders, so many of them to be seen living simultaneously in the present and the past, that you constantly find the now in the then and the then in the now.”
―Lewis H. Lapham, The World in Time podcast (Lapham’s Quarterly)

“A magpie book full of intriguing anthropological sketches . . . that fits neatly into the growing library of modern British natural history writing, alongside the best of Nan Shepherd, Robert Macfarlane, and Roger Deakin. A splendid assessment of the many ways there are to be a person, for good and ill.”
―Kirkus Reviews (starred)

“A wondrous and moving examination . . . To get back in touch with the ‘constant ecstatic contact’ [with nature] he argues humans need, Charles Foster witnesses shimmering visions, eats roadkill, contemplates birdsong and language, and hypothesizes that consciousness exists beyond humans. Foster is a wonderful prose stylist, and knows how to build a case and support it with plentiful detail. This powerful account is a remarkable achievement.”
―Publishers Weekly (starred)

“Being Human is a startling reset on our understanding of the journey of human thought. Approaching the question from a totally new perspective of lived experience, Charles Foster shows us how we came to be the people we are, with the values we exert in the world. Not only are the revelations startling, but the metaphoric power of Foster’s language is frequently astonishing. I wish I’d written this book.”
―Carl Safina, author of Becoming Wild

“What a mad, brilliant, mind-expanding book. Being a Human offers a thrilling deep dive through our evolutionary past, and a witty and learned commentary on why we are the way we are―and what wisdom we’ve lost along the way. Foster is a true modern polymath who writes with wit, humor and heart.”
―Cal Flyn, author of Islands of Abandonment

“Hugely moving, filled with intelligence, Being a Human scurries between centuries with us between its teeth. Charles Foster has invoked a living presence in these pages, a contract with the uncanny. To know a thing about the future we need to retrace our steps into our old mind. We could start here.”
―Martin Shaw, author of Smoke Hole

“Charles Foster’s writing is matchless. No one else could tackle the whole of human evolution, the history and implications of our ‘inadequate mutations,’ with such wit and elegance. Brace yourselves for a thrilling encounter with the other, with the marvelous, terrifying spectacle of the self.”
―Helen Mort, author of Never Leave the Dog Behind

“Being a Human is a work of shaggy genius. Its subject is gargantuan in scale; its humor has a reckless panache; its argument is brilliantly original; and above all it is written with a matchless audacity of soul. It is one of the most important books I have ever read.”
―Jay Griffiths, author of Why Rebel?

“A daredevil read. Once again, Charles Foster has journeyed to places most of us wouldn’t dare and emerged with a book that is passionate and kind, deeply intelligent and uproariously funny.”
―Helen Jukes, author of A Honeybee Heart Has Five Openings

“A brilliant, inventive, and unsettling exploration of our glorious and broken nature, Foster’s work shakes us out of dozy estrangement from our own humanity and welcomes us into the mysteries of belonging. Its richness demands careful reading.”
―David George Haskell, author of The Forest Unseen

“This is the most wonderful book―deftly written, highly imaginative, and a delight to read―and its message is such that its importance simply cannot be overstated. It gives a devastatingly clear portrait of humanity as we have become, and of what we once had―and still could have―but instead are in the process of throwing away, perhaps forever.”
―Iain McGilchrist, author of The Master and His Emissary

“Being a Human is one of the most original inquiries into the who, what, and why or human existence to appear in recent years. Charles Foster writes with inspiring brilliance, originality, and simplicity. I love this book. It should be widely read, for the benefit of all us humans.”
―Larry Dossey, author of One Mind

“Fascinating . . . When you read the book, it’ll make you think.”
―The Circle of Insight podcast

Cry of the Wild

“Foster is the kind of effortlessly adept writer likely to drive other authors to envy, and his bold gamble to break the scientific taboo around imagining animals’ interior lives pays off magnificently. Readers will be awed.” ―Starred Review Publishers Weekly

“Highly imaginative… Evocative and beautifully written, it’s a deeply immersive read.” —Observer

“Fiercely polemical, forcing the reader to see the world in a new light… Charles Foster is an original thinker with a strangely compelling prose style… Cry of the Wild is thought-provoking, profound, at times infused with a beautifully wistful lyricism and often witty.” ―Country Life

“Foster [brings] a sense of wonder: geese fly in from the north with snow falling from their wings; imagined through the eyes of a young rabbit, a white owl wafts through the still night air like thistledown, a strangely beautiful occurrence that might at any moment end the rabbit’s life… He avoids the temptations of anthropomorphism while reminding us that we who share these traits are more vulnerably and elegantly animal than we pretend.” —Literary Review

“Emotional without being anthropomorphic, it is a thought-provoking read.” ―BBC Wildlife Magazine

“Like Tarka, the stories in Cry of the Wildare not written for children. They take on the qualities of myth and magic which touch the source of our deepest feelings. How does the word on the printed page do this? … the prose is muscular and astonishing… “Immersion” is a word commonly used about reading these days. I dislike it intensely. The sound of the word feels cold, unpleasant, like being pressed underwater. Not at all the deep sobbing that emerged from somewhere as I sat with these stories… This is not like any other nature book.” ― Caught by the River