Wildhood
The Epic Journey from Adolescence to Adulthood in Humans and Other Animals
Table of Contents
About The Book
A New York Times Editor’s Pick
People Best Books Fall 2019
Chicago Tribune 28 Books You Need to Read Now
Booklist’s Top Ten Sci-Tech Books of 2019
“It blew my mind to discover that teenage animals and teenage humans are so similar. Both are naive risk-takers. I loved this book!” —Temple Grandin, author of Animals Make Us Human and Animals in Translation
A revelatory investigation of human and animal adolescence and young adulthood from the New York Times bestselling authors of Zoobiquity.
With Wildhood, Harvard evolutionary biologist Barbara Natterson-Horowitz and award-winning science writer Kathryn Bowers have created an entirely new way of thinking about the crucial, vulnerable, and exhilarating phase of life between childhood and adulthood across the animal kingdom.
In their critically acclaimed bestseller, Zoobiquity, the authors revealed the essential connection between human and animal health. In Wildhood, they turn the same eye-opening, species-spanning lens to adolescent young adult life. Traveling around the world and drawing from their latest research, they find that the same four universal challenges are faced by every adolescent human and animal on earth: how to be safe, how to navigate hierarchy; how to court potential mates; and how to feed oneself. Safety. Status. Sex. Self-reliance. How human and animal adolescents and young adults confront the challenges of wildhood shapes their adult destinies.
Natterson-Horowitz and Bowers illuminate these core challenges through the lives of four animals in the wild: Ursula, a young king penguin; Shrink, a charismatic hyena; Salt, a matriarchal humpback whale; and Slavc, a roaming European wolf. Through their riveting stories—and those of countless others, from adventurous eagles and rambunctious high schooler to inexperienced orcas and naive young soldiers—readers get a vivid and game-changing portrait of adolescent young adults as a horizontal tribe, sharing behaviors and challenges, setbacks and triumphs.
Upending our understanding of everything from risk-taking and anxiety to the origins of privilege and the nature of sexual coercion and consent, Wildhood is a profound and necessary guide to the perilous, thrilling, and universal journey to adulthood on planet earth.
About The Authors
Barbara Natterson-Horowitz, MD, is a Visiting Professor at Harvard University in the Department of Human Evolutionary Biology. She is also Professor of Medicine/Cardiology at UCLA and President of the International Society of Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health. She is the coauthor of Zoobiquity and Wildhood.
Kathryn Bowers is an animal behaviorist and writer who has taught at UCLA and Harvard. A Future Tense Fellow at New America in Washington, DC, she was an editor at the Atlantic Monthly, CNN-International in London, and at Zócalo Public Square in Los Angeles. She is the coauthor of Zoobiquity and Wildhood.
About The Reader
Product Details
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio (September 17, 2019)
- Runtime: 10 hours and 23 minutes
- ISBN13: 9781508297352
Raves and Reviews
"Narrator Robin Miles adds a continuous tone of excitement to this scientific exploration of life as a teenage mammal. The authors cleverly examine what they label 'wildhood'—those curious and naïve years after childhood and before adulthood. Much like the audiobook's young subjects, Miles's voice pops with energy. She picks up the pace and adds tension when drama is called for, such as the stalking of penguins by a leopard seal, and other such scenes that show animal behavior. Whether detailing the complex hierarchy of a hyena den or comparing social media 'likes' to primate grooming habits, her narration carries each scene to its dramatic conclusion. Miles's performance makes expanding one's understanding of adolescent mammals great fun."
– AudioFile Magazine
Resources and Downloads
High Resolution Images
- Book Cover Image (jpg): Wildhood Unabridged Audio Download 9781508297352
- Author Photo (jpg): Barbara Natterson-Horowitz Photograph by Joanna DeGeneres(0.1 MB)
Any use of an author photo must include its respective photo credit
- Author Photo (jpg): Kathryn Bowers Photograph by Alison Sheehy(0.1 MB)
Any use of an author photo must include its respective photo credit
