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  • Published: 2 April 2018
  • ISBN: 9781784705954
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 288
  • RRP: $28.00

The Inner Life of Animals

Surprising Observations of a Hidden World




The mysteries and emotional richness of the animal world revealed as never before, from the author of the Sunday Times bestseller The Hidden Life of Trees.

Can horses feel shame? Do deer grieve? Why do roosters deceive hens?

We tend to assume that we are the only living things able to experience feelings but have you ever wondered what’s going on in an animal’s head? From the leafy forest floor to the inside of a bee hive, The Inner Life of Animals opens up the animal kingdom like never before. We hear the stories of a grateful humpback whale, of a hedgehog who has nightmares, and of a magpie who commits adultery; we meet bees that plan for the future, pigs who learn their own names and crows that go tobogganing for fun. And at last we find out why wasps exist.

  • Published: 2 April 2018
  • ISBN: 9781784705954
  • Imprint: Vintage
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 288
  • RRP: $28.00

Also by Peter Wohlleben

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Praise for The Inner Life of Animals

The Inner Life of Animals will rock your world. Surprising, humbling, and filled with delight, this book shows us that animals think, feel, and know in much the same way as we do -- and that their lives are, to them, as precious as ours are to us.

Sy Montgomery, author of THE SOUL OF AN OCTOPUS

An important reminder that while we surely are different from other animals, the similarities in our cognitive, emotional, and moral lives are not only surprising and daunting, but very real.

Marc Bekoff, author of THE EMOTIONAL LIVES OF ANIMALS

Peter Wohlleben’s convincing, highly readable stories about free-living and domestic animals show there’s much overlap between how humans and other animals experience bonding, loss, and the great, shared themes of life.

Carl Safina, author of BEYOND WORDS: WHAT ANIMALS THINK AND FEEL

With the same charm and clarity that drew so many readers to The Hidden Life of Trees, Peter Wohlleben has produced another gem. I found delight on every page, thanks to the author’s rare skill at blending scientific discoveries with his own wealth of insightful personal experiences.

Jonathan Balcombe, author of WHAT A FISH KNOWS

Animal lovers everywhere will be enthralled. Find out what squirrels, deer, and other animals really do out in the woods.

Temple Grandin, author of ANIMALS IN TRANSLATION

A tour de force. Wohlleben’s love of animals is apparent on every page of this absorbing book, and he has a special gift for allowing the rest of us to feel his enthusiasm and share in his knowledge and personal observations in a very simple way … Reading this book is pure delight.

Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson, author of WHEN ELEPHANTS WEEP

Wouldn’t it be fascinating to know what animals think? Here, Peter Wohlleben explores a range of bestial emotions we didn’t know existed… unveiling remarkable insights into their hidden lives in the process

Country Living

Wohlleben is connecting with something big here… He truffles up some wonderful animal facts, too… Wohlleben’s empathy with animals can be touching and illuminating

James McConnachie, Sunday Times

Always fascinating… Wry, avuncular, careful and kind, Wohlleben guides us from one creature to the next

Richard Kerridge, Guardian

Entertaining and enthusiastic

Tim Smith-Laing, Daily Telegraph

Wohlleben presents short chapter in bite-sized portions, so the reader has a constant sense of learning something new almost with every page ... The formula is provably winning. I still felt I was on a robust learning curve as subjects as diverse as motherly love, gratitude, deception, desire, shame and knowledge of good and evil were explored one by one ... fascinating

Katharine Norbury, Observer

The tone is friendly and informal and the prose largely free of scientific jargon… Entertaining and thought-provoking

Mark Cocker, Spectator

Captivating… Intriguing… Wondrous

Saga Magazine

[Wohlleben] neatly combines anecdotes and scientific evidence in his search for the answers to some basic questions, such as do animals feel things the way we do?... Wohlleben has no doubt that all animals have a rich inner life. By the end of this delightful, surprising book, most readers will be persuaded that he is right.

Nick Rennison, Daily Mail

A book which is so fascinating and moving that it has genuinely made me more fond of trees.

Bookseller

A fascinating read

Sam Swannack, on COUNTRYFILE

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Just for fun

In The Inner Life of Animals, Peter Wohlleben explores an age-old question.