Sierra

I love this book and feel it deserves more attention considering the astronomical popularity of the author's Twilight. I think this has wider appeal in terms of subject matter, target audience, and the way it was written. If you're not much a fan of Twilight, but enjoy science fiction and romance, you might just love this. And if you love Twilight... what took you so long?? Read it! Don't watch the movie beforehand though... not a fan. It's been a while since I saw it, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't "good bad" like many people see the Twilight movies.

A must-have book for anyone who wants to do effective and ethical horse training the only way scientific evidence can support. This book is a perfect combination of accessibly introducing you to the science of behaviour and learning (which will make you a better, more adaptable trainer beyond this book) with lots of practical step-by-step instruction and troubleshooting to get you training lots of behaviours. I previously bought the 1st edition and now also have the 2nd; I was very excited for the new section about consent training and to support the author in this update. She is an amazing trainer and person. I have been watching her equine training and behaviour videos available on YouTube for many years and her content is one of the resources that saw me through the transition from traditional -R (negative reinforcement/pressure-based) horsemanship to +R training with horses. This knowledge is priceless and this author was the first to put it into literary form for application to horses. She is a trailblazer.

This book is mind-blowing. Anyone who has any interest in, or interaction with, animals should read this. I have always had a high opinion of animals' intelligence, but even I could not help but be amazed by the things I read in this book about the cognitive abilities of animals (in the least patronizing way possible). The most important thing I learned when I first read this book was that there is no hierarchy of intelligence as is commonly thought. When we say, for example, "dolphins are extremely intelligent" or "dogs are smarter than cats", what is the reference point? Humans. Because we are humans, we compare every other organism's intelligence to our own. This is natural. However, as de Waal points out, there are multiple intelligences, as many as every species, and comparing the intelligences of other organisms evolved within other ecological niches than ourselves to our own way of thinking is incorrect. The more correct thing to say would be "dolphin cognition is very similar to our own" or "dogs' cognition is more similar to ours than cats' is". We are not the smartest organism. We think an animal is "smart" when they think and act like we do instead of looking at how well their cognitive abilities allow them to live their own non-human lives in their own non-human environments. Every animal has the best intelligence for the environment and life history they evolved within. That is evolution's whole thing after all. I highly recommend reading this and then following it with de Waal's Mama's Last Hug.

This book is fantastic. You think you're getting a book on fungi, and you are, you really, really are, but the author has necessarily connected the world of fungi to our lives as humans, to plants (which are insepperable from our lives and often overshadow fungi), and to the environment and past and future of the planet. While reading this I kept telling my family interesting facts I'd learned; I couldn't help myself. You walk away from this book with a new, more complete perspective on the world. As a bonus, the author has the best name.

I've got to say, in my opinion this is a very rare example of a movie improving on its source material. I enjoy the movie, so this review is going to specifically compare the two, not look at the book for its own sake. This story is much better served through visual storytelling. The film gives Alec and the Black more time together on the beach, enriching their relationship and making its mutual nature far more believable than the utilitarian tone of the book. The beach scenes are infinitely improved on in the film by not being filtered through the thoughts of literary Alec. The book focuses more on Alec's desire to ride and control the Black and of course race, whereas the movie, at least during the beach scenes, shows Alec earning the Black's trust through time together, providing food, and mutual play. I also feel the film's choice to age-down Alec from a teenager to a younger boy better serves the story and I appreciate how they had Alec keep the horse in his front yard at first because as a child I fantasized about having a horse in my back yard.

I love this book and feel it deserves more attention considering the astronomical popularity of the author's Twilight. I think this has wider appeal in terms of subject matter, target audience, and the way it was written. If you're not much a fan of Twilight, but enjoy science fiction and romance, you might just love this. And if you love Twilight... what took you so long?? Read it! Don't watch the movie beforehand though... not a fan. It's been a while since I saw it, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't "good bad" like many people see the Twilight movies as. Might turn you off.