Let's learn all about the human body, but this time, let's treat the woman's body as the default, instead of some kind of inferior version of the man's body. This wide-ranging exploration of what goes on in our bodies is riveting. It's anthropological, biological, and sociological all at once. It's also rather quirky, with some speculation on what made our prehistoric foremothers tick, but overall, I found it informative and entertaining. I especially enjoyed a section on legs (really about the skeleton and musculature) that featured a woman who was going through Army Ranger training, a rigorous physical and mental challenge that defeats over half of those (overwhelmingly men) do not complete. (Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a digital review copy.)

Wow - what an enlightening and fascinating book. As a woman, it was incredibly empowering to read about my history on how we came to be and the importance we have in this world. Historically women have been brushed aside as “nothing more” than baby makers - this book has opened my eyes and confirmed that we have a much larger weight in the history of the human race (and that our role in making a baby is a crazy and miraculous feat that should receive higher praise and gratitude in modern society). This book taught me to love every single part of my body and to really appreciate what it is to be a woman. I highly recommend it to everyone, regardless man or woman - I think it’s important for everyone to learn about the history of ourselves and where we came from/how we’ve evolved and the struggles and differences in how more than half of the population lives.

This is a fascinating look into the female body, its evolution, history and genetics since the beginning of life and up until now. The author explores the different Eves that made us who we are today. From the first female to produce milk, the first placentas, the beginning of bipedalism and how a woman’s body functions. It is no surprise that most of science has been based on the male body but, as this volume makes extremely clear, the differences with the female anatomy are both subtle and huge. Many concepts are necessarily based on speculation, since we the fossils that exist are limited. The author makes sure to explain where her deductions come from. Even the chapters devoted to more abstract concepts, such as monogamy or love, are based on what we can learn from actual scientific evidence. It was a slow read for me, since the content is dense, but it was still approachable and I understood all the concepts. I especially enjoyed the comparisons with non-human animals and how we relate and differ from them. For women who want to learn more about their own bodies, as well as men who are curious about where we come from.
I chose to read this book and all opinions in this review are my own and completely unbiased. Thank you, #NetGalley/#Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor!

Thanks to Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor, Knopf, and NetGalley for the advanced readers copy.

A fascinating book! Evolution focusing on female traits broken into large chapters. Milk, Womb, Perception, Legs, Tools, Brain, Voice, Menopause, and Love. This book explores the Eve of each of these areas in our evolution and discusses why the advances were needed at that time. I found myself coming back to read anytime I could. It is long and very scientific but also clever and funny. I highlighted so many funny quips to save for later!
I love it and the cover is stunning!

I thought this would be more like a companion to Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez. The opening to Eve was excellent; I loved hearing about the author's anecdote about how simply don't know how liposuction affects breast-milk production and why that matters. However, the book lost me with me with it's focus on the paleontological aspects of women's biology, so it was more disconnected from women's humanity than I like for a book with a social justice lens. That said, it's clear that author is an expert in her field and knows here stuff. I'm just not her ideal reader.

I received a free e-arc of this book through Netgalley. I read that this is the female continuation/answer to the [book:Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind|23692271] which I read earlier this year. This book gives so many interesting facts about women, about men, about animals and the developments that led to us today arguing over who has the right to control women's bodies. I will never look at Mallard ducks the same way again. The only thing I don't love in the Kindle version is that the footnotes are all at the end of the lengthy chapters and I don't want to flip through all the pages to figure out which footnote goes to which conversation, but the footnotes are still worthwhile, informative and often funny to read through. Lots of fun facts in this book that make it worth the read.

I really enjoyed this well-researched book on evolution. It is time that we acknowledge that importance that the female gender was for our beginnings and future. And the human species continues to be wonderfully diverse. Let's lift that up and celebrate!!

I just reviewed Eve by Cat Bohannon. #Eve #NetGalley

I read this book as a pre-release e-book obtained through NetGalley, provided by the publisher.

This book was refreshing as it’s the first I’ve ever read that focused on the female side of biology, paleontology, evolution, and anthropology. Starting 200 million years ago, when our first platypus-like great….grandmother first began making milk from her sweat glands, into when ancestors of humans began to walk upright, through the invention of tools, through the advent of language, the focus is on women or females. In fact, it’s quite likely that the first Homo Habliis to invent a tool was a woman – who needed it in her community to dig roots, kill small animals, or to protect her community while the men were away in hunting parties.

Although this is a science-heavy book, the language she uses includes folksy terms like kiddo, and describing things which suck. It makes the whole thing more readable and fun, rather than a dry scientific text. It is extremely well referenced: A significant amount of the book is references and sidebars of notes.

As the book goes through all of these species - both those which are believed to be our direct ancestors and other related species, one has to consider where, in all of this, did one of these creatures become "human"? What is it about them that makes them human rather than an animal? Could it be society and cooperation? Many animals, from bees to wolves have cooperative societies? Could it be tool use? Could it be language? Could it be art or written language? Could it be the advent of primitive gynecology or reproductive choice? Is it something else? Moreover, how do we tell when a creature developed a spoken language? The physiology and evidence in the fossil record is explained in a detail I had never understood before. I also learned a lot about how other animals prevent reproduction from rape, the kernel of truth behind the politician's saying, "Women have ways of shutting all that down.", That's true for females of some other species. I learned in this book how humans used plants and other tools to implement something which some other animals have and modern humans do not.

Over time, humans developed big brains. With that, and for women to have a pelvis and birth canal narrow enough so that she could walk, came problems giving birth to live big-brained and wide-shouldered infants who were extremely needy for their first few years – and keep their mothers alive not only for childcare and for future births, but the loss of a woman was very costly. Furthermore, modern humans are one of the only species in the animal kingdom that goes through menopause, then lives another 25% or 30% of her life unable to produce offspring? Why was it beneficial to keep women who could no longer reproduce, and were less able to do other work to care for the community? The answer is remembering the past. Elders in a society can remember what they did when disasters came before, and know what to do if or when they strike again.

Why did we develop these big brains, capable of solving complicated problems, inventing tools, allowing for a complex social structure, devising language – along with the rules of grammar, and ultimately cities, governments, and nations? Why, when in nature the most intelligent animals tend to be predators rather than prey?

Why did our big brains, which lead to a problematic reproductive system which killed and kills many hominid females lead to social structures that include sexism? Why, in many cases, are women more invested in sexist norms of a culture than are men? And, is it something that now causes humankind more harm than it does good? Today, it creates more problems than it solves.

Thanks to Netgalley.com for the advance copy to read in exchange for an honest review!

It really should be 4.5 stars, but Goodreads doesn't allow halves, and it has to be nearly life-changing to get 5 stars. Still, this is very much my kind of book; I'm fascinated by discussions of why things are the way they are. I've read enough of these that there's often not much new to me in each one. However, Eve managed to provide a lot of new information and ideas. For example, I couldn't believe I'd never learned that the configuration of ovaries and Fallopian tubes spread out to the sides of the uterus, as shown in every informational diagram on the female reproductive system, does not reflect the real squished-together position inside the body.

The book covers a wide range of femaleness though the eons, from before there were even mammals up to the modern world, and it's not just reproduction that is affected by biological gender but things like the evolution of the type of color vision that humans usually have. (The book does not ignore the existence of trans people, though.) And everything is well backed-up with references; I was actually a touch disappointed to reach page 398 of 575 and find that the book proper was over and the remaining third was endnotes and bibliography. I would have read more chapters, even though we had reached the modern day and as much as can be said yet on human development.

Wow!!!!
“Eve” — a book about ‘women/human evolution’ is brilliant - ambitious- informative - thought-provoking - educational - historical- incredibly researched — not easy-light-bedtime reading — but a remarkable resource book.

The ‘Table of Contents’ gives a hint on the topics and themes being examined:
Milk
Womb
Perception
Legs
Tools
Brain
Voice
Menopause
Love

“The fact of the matter is that until very recently, the study of the biologically, female body has lagged far behind the study of the male body”.

From pregnancy to mothers milk, to inoculating children against the upcoming stresses of adulthood—and everything in between— caretaking mothers have long evolved to take advantage of every pathway available to prepare their offspring for their looming independence. Because we’re mammals, the nipple is one of our first lines of communication.
“Milk is something we ‘do’ as much as something we make. It has evolved to be social”.

There is much to take in:
Women’s bodies - perceptions, (skinny, fat, lanky, petite, body parts, etc.), pregnancy, motherhood - the human womb - sexuality - gender- menstruation- food cravings, nutritional deficiencies - survival - the musculoskeletal system- post menopausal women -osteoporosis - ligaments - joints - aging women - female sex hormones - metabolism - the history of feminism— female reproductive choices, and strategies — etc.

Many abnormalities are tied to malfunctions and girls’ fetal development, and the most common glitches are probably tied to more recent developments in our evolution.
“It’s been a very long time, for example, since our ancestors had two uteri, but not as long since our uterus was probably that minor, fibrous wall, and that leftover ‘dent’ at the top was probably the last to go, given that one and ten of us still have it. The little dent doesn’t seem to negatively affect pregnancy outcomes, so it’s safe to assume there isn’t a lot of Evolutionaries pressure to get rid of it”.

I learn a lot — a more expanded context about what is involved in being a woman—and being a human.
I had no idea that “one in 4,500 girls are born every year without a uterus”.

Highly recommended—
—there is something for everyone to learn and enjoy in “Eve”.

Thank you Netgalley and Cat Bohannon for a free eARC in exchange for my personal opinion/ review.

I think to appreciate this book you must be a woman. I don't think a male would take the time. There are some really quite interesting things in this book that make you go "hmmmm"... I love the statistics and I love all of the sources being sites. I think this book was well developed. I believe that there are MANY trending current events discussed in this book that need to be discussed in such detail a this book does, like Covid, earning between sexes, sexually transmitted infections, education, etc. Great writing.

Interesting book. A little dense of a read at times but makes sense given the subject. Would definitely recommend!

As an adult with significant disabilities, I can recall reaching this stage in my life when I became incredibly frustrated with what I perceived as the weaknesses and limitations of my physical being.

It seemed like everything was going wrong and deeply lamented the loss of feeling "normal."

After a while, I began a deep dive into various aspects of my disabilities. I learned about my body. I learned about spina bifida. I learned about hydrocephalus, amputation, and traumatic brain injury. I learned as much as I could about history and function and biology and the universality of my being.

Over time, I began to realize and accept that my body is pretty amazing.

I thought of this period of my life often while reading Cat Bohannon's remarkable "Eve: How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evolution," a deep dive into what the female body is, how it came to be, and how this evolution still shapes all our lives today.

Bohannon picks up where "Sapiens" left off, covering the past 200 million years to tell the story of what it really means to be a woman in a way that somehow, unfathomably, both incredibly entertaining and stunningly well researched with hundreds, and I mean hundreds, of cited sources along the way. "Eve" is both incredibly satisfying yet also leaves you craving more of Bohannon's curiosity, insight, knowledge, and wit.

"Eve" can be an overwhelming book. It's incredibly academic yet also remarkably accessible in language, style, and structure. Bohannon seemingly understands that to really get her points across she needs to find a way to immerse us in this information without leaving us gasping for our literary breaths. Mission accomplished.

I was in awe of both the intimacy and universality of "Eve" as Bohannon explores a variety of topics in exploring, essentially, what it means to biologically be a woman and that tells the story of womanhood throughout the centuries.

To call "Eve" some sort of feminist manifesto seems inadequate as it's really a manifesto for humanity that places, in ways never done before, women into the picture of medicine, neurobiology, paleoanthropology, and evolutionary biology.

Bohannon writes with candor the history of breasts and vaginas and womb and love and menopause and so much more. It's honestly deliriously awesome. It's informative yet it's far beyond informative because it builds a vision of womanhood that is truly awe-inspiring.

For far too long, the world has told the story of human history through the male body (though perhaps not the disabled male body). With "Eve," Bohannon passionately declares a corrective and beautifully brings to life the power and glory of the female body and how it truly has driven 200 million years of human evolution.

Bohannon's writing here is both profound in its knowledge and poetic in its narrative rhythms. I learned so much throughout "Eve," yet what is equally as profound is how much I actually enjoyed that learning from beginning to end. "Eve" is a revelatory vision of the history of womanhood that celebrates that history with a sense of joy and wonder.

It's not often that I reach the end of a 600-page book and think to myself "Give me more." But, oh yes, "Give me more!"

This is a fascinating book that examines the importance of women to the evolution of the human race throughout recorded and pre-recorded history.

Looking at multiple issues from a woman's point of view, it manages to be forceful without being polemical. (Though, understandably, there are times when the author's tone is rueful.,)

As someone who's worked in the medical field, I know firsthand how the medical profession, in both practice and research, has had a blind spot about women-specific issues. The author talks about many such instances and they ring true.

The book is written in a lively matter, but almost every page is filled with some information that's either surprising, informative, or both.

This is definitely a book to read for enjoyment and return to often.

I enjoy books about evolution, and taking the topic from a female perspective was really interesting to me. As someone who has read other books on the topic one of my favorite parts about this book was, from the introduction I was learning new to me information, which really set this book apart from other books that I have read on the topic. I found the chapter on the evolution of the womb especially fascinating.

I was disappointed in the chapter on the brain that the discussion on dyslexia was more stereotypical than an actual representation of dyslexic thinking, and also male focused. If the author were to do a simple Google search they would see that this section of their book in inaccurate, as well as learn that dyslexic thinking is a skill that would have been quite useful during human evolution. There are many articles, and studies on the topic. I read an ARC, and did not see a footnote in the book in the section of this topic, and doing a text search for dyslexia did not bring one up either.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC of this book.

This is a unique book about the uniqueness of women and their role in human evolution. The author insightfully suggests ways in which female physiology evolved and affected (and continues to affect) behavior and social interactions. It is refreshing to read a book like this that does not try to take a side in the pseudo-debate about biology and culture. Rather, it explains how biology has an impact on culture. Many of the author's insights are speculative, but not wildly so. She clearly points out what is fact and what is speculation, and even her speculations are well-grounded in facts. Finally, the tone of this book is immensely refreshing. Talking about biology can be boring, but not here. Cat Bohannon writes with flair and attitude not normally seen in treatments of human physiology. The book is political (aren't all books?), but the content is not driven by political goals. Rather, the book is good science that informs a political agenda of human decency.

This is really thought provoking and a unique perspective that I’ve not often seen in this area of nonfiction writing. I appreciate the author’s marshaling of the scholarship and giving lots to think about.