Queer Ducks (and Other Animals) explores queerness in the natural world, showing the reader that things we view as queer, are rampant in the wild.

I liked all of the information in this book. It was well researched. The addition of the scientist interviews was incredible. That will show teens that there is a place in science for everyone and shows the vastness of the career field. I don't think that the comics and graphics added much. I would have rather seen either photos of the animals or more graphics.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

Really great book!
Another non-fiction title that is perfect for reading in bite-size chunks.
I love learning about different animals, and how we as humans (thanks men) have learned so much about the animal world while also choosing to ignore blatant evidence of same-sex relationships to further the religious agenda of the day.
Super great read! I learned so much!

This book wasn’t available on kindle as an ARC and my temporary version deleted itself before I could finish it.

I can’t publicly review it since I couldn’t read enough and that’s a shame as I really loved what I got to read and I would have probably widely recommended it to my readers on various platforms.

What I was able to read was extremely well written, interesting, entertaining and important information.

An absolutely delightful book with so many resources to use! I especially enjoyed learning about the albatross lesbian couple. Sometimes, science brings out the best of our nature and reminds us that there's always something new to learn.

Queer Ducks (and Other Animals) by Eliot Schrefer is delightfully entertaining and surprisingly informative. This was a much more thorough exploration of animal sexuality than I anticipated, and I was pleasantly surprised to find a lot of scientific explanations for animal happenings. The dense scientific text is broken up with engaging interviews and commentary, along with hilarious (but still educational!) comic strips.

Thank you, Netgalley for the ARC of Queer Ducks. It was very informative while being entertaining. The cartoon animal GSA that appeared throughout the book was a nice break in the science. Eliot Schrefer set this book up in a very cool way, with chapters on specific animals followed by Q&As with queer scientists. I’d love to put this book into the hands of many former students.

This is a great and fun nonfiction book with a bunch of interesting and funny illustrations! There’s accessible and even silly prose, and it never gets too positive to be patronizing. Also, I learned a lot about many different kinds of animals. It’s a refreshing read when a lot of nonfiction queer books right now are too In The Moment and you need something more lighthearted. I really recommend reading this. Five stars.

I get that this book is trying to do, but I think it's doing that reaching thing that feels antithetical to what it's aiming to do. The idea that queer interactions both socially and sexually are not "against nature" as one so often hears is an interesting one. If you cut out the introduction and the personal stories that try so hard to make this connect to human sociology, this would be a fun book about queer animals in their natural environments. Who doesn't want to hear about the penguins of And Tango Makes Three fame?

Understanding that humans are also animals, this book was still just trying too hard to say "Look gay is in nature, [example] & [example] so I'm ok." I wanted to like this book, but it was just not the vibe.

It was not what I had hoped and people looking for a light hearted pride read might want to skip this one.

Thank you to NetGalley, HarperCollins Children's Books, and Katherine Tegen Books for the digital review copy to read. This is an absolutely phenomenal book that wonderfully combines scientific research with personal memories, expert interviews, and historical discoveries, presented with helpful insight that translates biological research into useful real-world learnings. I'm so impressed that this book can have you laughing one minute and then have you critically assessing how scientific bias can be passed down (inadvertently or very intentionally) the next. I think a lot about how stories get into textbooks (and what is left out or exists only in researcher blind spots) and this book is not only fills in much-needed gaps but explains how those gaps emerge and what we can do to actively be more aware of it. Something else this book does well is avoid putting the whole complex human world of gender and relationships onto the animal kingdom, while also very clearly validating that there's nothing unnatural about diverse sexuality -- after all, look at the beauty of nature telling us exactly that.

Did this book have me at the first chapter about queer penguins? Indeed, it did! Queer Ducks is a well-researched nonfiction novel about the exploration of queer behaviour in the animal kingdom.

What makes Queer Ducks such a charming read is, of course, its author. Schrefer almost holds a conversation with the reader throughout presenting the scientific evidence of queer behaviour in animals—and added to that, there are little intermissions between the chapters in which the reader gets to learn more about Schrefer himself through biographical stories, fun anecdotes and just general wonderments that make you think about how you see the world through a very biased lens based on what you’ve learned in school (and life so far) in terms of heteronormativity. There are also fun cartoons and sweet drawings that make this nonfiction feel almost interactive. If you’re hesitant to pick this up because you think nonfiction can be dry sometimes, rest assured: none of that dreariness resides between these pages. Instead, Schrefer offers readers a witty, humorous and thought-provoking exploration of the very not unnatural but totally normal queer behaviour of animals throughout history.

What I love most though about Queer Ducks is its message to us humans who belong to the LGBTQ+ community: queerness has always existed, even in the world of animals, even when it has been pushed under the rug, hidden from the public eye or been explained away. Schrefer manages to offer readers subtle validation and hope while talking about how normal it is to be queer – both as an animal and as a human (yes, we are also animals but you get the point) living in the 21st century. Claims that queer behaviour is unnatural are eschewed in this book and instead proven wrong with insightful research and riveting interviews with specialists (who are mostly part of the LGTBQ+ community themselves!) in the field that I hope will help its audience understand just how perfectly okay it is to be queer.

Well-researched, charmingly illustrated and infused with humour, Queer Ducks is a fantastic nonfiction work about the prevalence of the vast variety of queerness in the animal kingdom. Whether you want to learn about the diverse and complex queer behaviour in animals or just want to read about bisexual penguins, this book’s sure to keep your attention!

This was an EXCELLENT read. I absolutely loved it. A few times I held my breath because I wasn't sure where the sentiment was going to go, but it was surprisingly super inclusive and I quickly lost the impulse to hold my breath the more I read and got to know the author's own standing. I've waited for a very long time for a book like this to come out and I really, truly cannot wait to share it with people, especially younger people who are in dire need of this sort of confirmation/affirmation in an increasingly hostile world that is actively trying to politicize them, along with those who want to go into the field. It has solid, credible information with a very compassionate touch that can only come from someone in the community. The interviews in each interlude were also wonderful and I cannot wait to see all the photos and charts that will be added during publishing. It'll definitely be worth a second read with those to help the context of the information provided.

I am on my way to place a pre-order for this immediately, as it was just that good!!

This book is just great the mix of science and facts with personal experience just makes this book both easy to read and something grabs the readers attention. I really enjoy that there are experts answering questions after some of the chapters. I really think that just brings together the research just a little bit more. Also, the comics are just perfect! They set the chapter up in such an amazing way. I need more of those comics. Thank you so much to Harper Collins Children books for allowing me to read an advance copy of this title.

The book feels well-researched, and it is definitely an unseen topic in YA nonfiction. That said, I do dislike the personal asides the author keeps inserting.

A funny yet also informative overview of the sexual diversity that exists within the animal kingdom. An essential read for anyone looking to know that they are not alone. 4 stars!

NetGalley ARC Educator 550974

I could not put this book down. The author's attention to detail concerning each animal's biology and relationship types were utterly fascinating. A great book to read and teach from.

*I received a free copy in exchange for an honest review*

“This is partly a book for lonely eleven-year-old Eliot, who only began to see himself as worthy of full respect many years after coming out” is one of the best ways to describe this book. It is for all the queer kids/adults who were (and sometimes still ARE) told that we are unnatural. I know tons of kids who could have used this book when we were growing up, and kids that, even now, might still find this book worth their time. Now on to my review.

I loved this book. I also loved the comic strips at the beginnings of chapters (that poor doodlebug! Kelch really ruined that poor guy’s life). It was great to read something that was both factual about nature but also wasn’t afraid to poke fun at just how weird the animal kingdom could get. There were also the historical facts about queerness in the human world that I found really interesting, and Schrefer’s commentary on everything was absolutely worthwhile to read. I don’t think I really needed to know about the Duke of Nevers and his thousands of soldier-satisfying goats, though.

This is an exploration of queerness through the lens of same-sex coupling in animals. Pushing back against the "it's unnatural" argument often heard from anti-lgbtq groups, Schrefer gives multiple examples of homosexuality in animals. The discovery and research of these animal habits is interspersed with snippets about Schrefer's own life, interviews with other professionals, and terms from the queer community. It's a fun and informal educational book.

Thank you to NetGalley for an eARC to review.

A traditional argument against homosexual behavior is that it’s just not natural. If pressed, the argument might continue that there is no evolutionary benefit to a pairing that doesn’t create children. This book utterly shatters the “not natural” argument. Sexual activity and gender expression are wildly variable across species, making homosexuality and bisexuality and gender fluidity incredibly natural phenomena. And not only natural: evolutionary beneficial both on an individual and societal level.

In some cases, more sex across the board (regardless of who with) equals more chances for babies. In other cases, same-sex sexual encounters reinforce important social bonds that increase survival rates either individually or for the group as a whole. Changing sex entirely can save an animal group’s genes from dying out, and these kinds of sex changes happen in myriad ways. There were other chapters on animals and polyamory, various kinds of reproduction, and still more ways of gender and sexual expression.

The upshot of this entire book is that sex and gender expression are a glorious prism in the animal kingdom. And spoiler: humans are animals. One of the most powerful single moments for me was when Schrefer describes the process of a human egg and sperm combining. The traditional tale involves intrepid, daring, determined sperm all vying for the chance to pass into a quiet, docile, receptive, submissive egg (yes, the Look Who’s Talking opening credits sums this up nicely). And he makes the point that **this is an incomplete story we tell ourselves to reinforce our existing notions of sex and gender.** He then goes on to describe human fertilization in greater detail, and with fewer sex-based stereotypes. So scientific observation, hypothesis, and publishing are all burdened by the scientists’ inherent worldviews, despite the emphasis on objectivity. When observers reported sex between a male and a female of any given species, it wasn’t always because they KNEW the animals’ sexes, but it was frequently due to the assumption that it MUST be a male and female.

My favorite feature was that each chapter was punctuated with a scientist interview. Many were queer scientists and this was a stellar way to offer readers exposure to real people doing science around animal sexuality. These mini interviews were not only interesting, but each one listed at least one place to see or read the scientist’s work, so it was a treasure trove of extra information.

My least favorite element was the cartoons. While they offered a visual break from the narrative, the information was so riveting they wasn’t necessary. There may have also been photos or other illustrations which had not gotten into the manuscript yet, and I would imagine photos would have been a better visual medium. I also didn’t really get a lot of the jokes, which probably says more about me than the cartoons. While I didn’t care for the cartoon illustrations, they didn’t distract me enough from the text to care much one way or another.

The voice of this book really threw me off - it came across as very middle grade (jokey, lots of asides, etc), but there was a lot of explicit sexual content that made this decidedly not a middle grade book. It's a bummer because I think both teens and preteens would be interested in a book about queer animals, but I don't know that this would work for either age range.