Best Title Ever. Worth reading if only for that. But still, a deep dive into the lives of bats and all we can learn from them. Flabbergasting!

The Genius Bat is an engaging and illuminating exploration of one of the most misunderstood animals on our planet. Yossi Yovel blends science, storytelling, and personal experience to create a book that is as entertaining as it is informative.

I loved how Yovel presents bats not only as fascinating biological marvels—capable of flight, longevity, and complex communication—but also as creatures that play an essential role in ecosystems around the world. He has a knack for making the science approachable, explaining complex concepts like echolocation and immune system adaptations in ways that are easy to grasp without ever oversimplifying.

What makes this book especially delightful is the human element. Yovel shares his adventures in the field, from rainforests to deserts, and introduces us to the quirky, passionate scientists who dedicate their lives to studying bats. These stories bring warmth and humor to the research, making the book feel personal as well as educational.

Whether you’re a science enthusiast, an animal lover, or simply curious about the natural world, The Genius Bat is a captivating read. It shines a light on an animal too often associated with fear or myth and reveals just how extraordinary bats truly are.

This is a great book for lay-people who have an interest in bats. It is very well written with a good balance of scientific information and field work stories by the author and other scientists.

Say the word, “bats” and immediately my heart beat climbs into the 100s. I am not alone.

Many people have creepy feelings about bats with the impression that they are blood-sucking vampires. This book is effective in reversing the negative image and shows how these animals are actually our friends.

Yossi Yovel has spent years studying and teaching students about these flying mammals. He gives readers a solid glimpse of his research along with several other scientists. He described one study of bats on an island of Mexico surrounded by dangerous waters. They miraculously were able to place tiny electronic devices on animals in caves to track their moves. It’s eye-opening research.

There’s much more about the socialization of bats, how they are able to travel for miles and how they track sound waves much like dolphins. I was shocked to learn that wind turbines have had a negative effect killing not only birds but also bats. What we believed was good for the environment is turning out to be ironically harmful. Few people are aware that bats have saved American farmers billions by eating hazardous insects. And then he addressed bats with diseases. It makes us naturally think of COVID-19.

It was interesting to a point and then I felt overwhelmed by the various research studies. It’s such a highly visible subject and it would make a greater impact to see photos of some of the species. However, for those who are curious about bats with the background, contributions from researchers and the progress that has been made, then this is a great resource.

My thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for a copy of this advanced book with an expected release date of October 7, 2025.

I usually love non-fiction about niche topics but this one didn’t keep me hooked. There’s lots of interesting information presented but I found the structure disorganized and hard to keep track of. DNF around 40% as I knew at this point I knew it wasn’t my thing.

Thanks to netgalley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

So much great information on a mammal you’ll definitely want to know more about! I received an advance copy of this book and enjoyed every chapter. The author writes in a style that’s easy to read, easy to understand, and genuinely fun.

I especially loved the stories about the “unique personalities” of the people who love and research bats. You don’t need to be a scientist—or even a big reader of nonfiction—to enjoy this book. Whether you love bats, fear them, dislike them, or just like tequila, you’ll still enjoy reading it and may even fall in love with these important creatures.

Each chapter weaves an engaging story, and as someone from Austin, TX, I especially appreciated the author’s chapter on the Austin bats. Highly recommended!

Such a surprisingly fun read! I love bats and I hate that they often get a bad rap (especially post Covid). This is an excellent blend of narrative storytelling and readable science, perfectly hitting that sweet spot in nonfiction. It's absolutely unique too, I kind of can't believe we haven't had a book like this sooner, but this this one is so good and the author such a skilled, thoughtful writer that it was well worth the wait!

This is a great handbook for any bat enthusiast, or even a student writing an essay about bats! It is very comprehensive while offering interesting anecdotes as well.

Fascinating in so many ways. Some of the science was over my head as a person with very little background in biology. The structure also could have benefited from some extra headings or ways to denote it was moving from one story to another. Chapters shifted and alternated from the author’s own research and adventures to the history of bat research and experiences of and interviews with other leading experts. If bats were not my favorite animals, I might not have hung in there so well. I still found this interesting, good-humored, and overall a worthwhile read (if a little inaccessible).

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s for the digital review copy in advance.

Full review to be posted at: cassieetter.com/eclecticallybookish/reviews/the-genius-bat closer to publication date

I went into this read knowing that bats were my friends because they eat the evil predators known to the unwary as MOSQUITOS, sleep upside down in the day, prowl around looking for food at night, and someone I know used to build a lot of bathouses. Now I am a lot smarter about bats (but they still eat mosquitos) their habits, peculiarities, and how they are able to take their singular place in the ecosystem AND the zoological world. Fascinating for this geek and for lots of non-geeks as well. This is a book easily read by the general public (and fun, too!). It is a really amazing study that I have now preordered for family (besides, I want to see the photos).
I requested and received a temporary unedited digital galley from St. Martin's Press via NetGalley.
Pub Date Oct 07, 2025 *****review #BookBub #goodreads #libraryThing #thestorygraph
#TheGeniusBat by #YossiYovel @stmartinspress @NetGalley
#onlyflyingmammal #NonFiction #bats #ecobiology #echolocation #manyspecies #anecdotes

As a self-proclaimed bat lover, I was thrilled to receive this ARC. Bats have always fascinated me, and I've always found it interesting just how each species of bat differs from the next. This book offered great insight on different species of bats, how they're researched, and ended on a note about bat conservation that left me thinking about bats I've encountered and my previous knowledge of them. However, it is very science-dense— if you do not think in-depth explanations of the mechanics behind experiments and their findings interesting, this may not be the book for you. I
Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the ARC in exchange for an honest review 🦇

If you’re looking for a book on bats, this might be for you! Inside, you will find a lot of information on bats covering everything from their roosting habits to their evolution. While there’s almost 1500 species of bats, some good coverage on a smaller selection of bats without touching on everything. I think that if you’re super interested in echolocation, this will be up your alley for sure.

That said, while this book was an interesting read, a lot more time was spent on covering the research community and travels than I expected. I was expecting a lot more information on bats, less echolocation coverage, and less research and travel coverage. I think that it was an enjoyable read, but it was different from what I was expecting. If you’re interested in this book, just know that it’s selective about the bat species covered and that there’s a huge emphasis on echolocation before jumping in. It’s all about adjusting your expectations so you’re not in for a surprise later because I was hoping for more bat species coverage than what was actually covered.

Bat lovers, or even just the bat-curious, should check out this book! I’ve always liked bats but can’t say I knew a lot about them, nor how we learned what we do know about them now. Yovel explains all of that in an engaging collection of anecdotes and research summaries, ranging all across the world. I sometimes found that the chapters jumped oddly back and forth between subtopics, but given the main topic was always bats, it basically worked for me. It was remarkable and often amusing to learn about the creative lengths researchers have gone to in order to study bat behavior. I definitely found myself sharing new bat facts with my household, and will be keeping more of a lookout for our flying mammal friends at night going forward!

My thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an advance copy of this new look at a creature famous from myth, one that sucks blood, is taken in form by vampires, a creature more feared than most, and yet is mostly misunderstood, a creature that fascinates many in science, including the author of this book.

A few years ago I had a cat Moira who was eighteen and not doing well. I was used to her sleeping most of the time, helping her find the litter box, and becoming more and more particular in her diet. One night though, Moira was on. Pacing the house, tail a flicker, jumping up on furniture and seemingly on watch for something. My first thought was that this was the end, a little bit of energy before her final sleep. Until a heard a flutter and a noise, and my little home had a bat in it. After a long chase, involving a butterfly net, a piece of cardboard, and an eighteen year-old cat acting like a kitten, I was able to trap the bat, and well throw it outside. There was something primal in my fear, and my fear that my Moira would catch the bat and die of rabies. Under the net though was a creature even more scared than me. And one that took quite a bit of time to climb out from the net when I threw everything outside. That was my only interest in bats, something that even my love of Batman, vampires and spooky houses and caves never made me want to know more about. After reading this book, I realize I have been missing out. And I want to know more. The Genius Bat: The Secret Life of the Only Flying Mammal by Yossi Yovel is an examination of bats, how humans study them, and more importantly the people that give their time, and lives, to finding out why these flying things do the things they do.

The book begins with a story about the desert, small bats, and designing and attaching small GPS systems to bats to find where they eat, and how they travel at night. This sets the scene for the book for the author, an ecologist and a neurobiologist clears up a few long standing myths about bats, they can walk, and climb with their hands, sometimes pretty fast, and an idea on the people who find them interesting. From there we learn things that most people know, about vampire bits, about the bats use of echolocation to find food, to get around, and a lot of new information. Bats can see. They have harems, the have to prove themselves almost all the times to their female mates. Bats have a language, a section that is quite well presented in how they learned this, and the experiments involved. Yovel also writes about bat researchers, many who found bats by chance, and discovered new things and new ways of looking at bats. Yovel travels the world, from deserts to islands available to the Mexican navy, to rainforests, and deep caves, sharing stories about both bats, and those who want to know more.

There are a lot of books coming out dealing with the animal world around us. Many are good, but lack that scientific bent, going more folksy, others are like peer review journals, with lots of facts, but no real sense of style or presentation. I enjoyed this book for its perfect mix. A mix of weird adults, smart adults, but bat people, trying to determine why bats do what they do, and stories about bats dancing to attract mates, using their hands, and much more. Yovel is a very good writer, funny, but very knowledgable, which helps. I learned quite alot about bats, information I can share with my precocious nephew, and enjoyed the book for its scientific and even adventure stories, with profiles of bat people. A very rare mix, that makes for a really good reading experience.

People who are interested in bats will learn a lot, as will people who think about entering the science field, which is slowly disappearing in this brave new world we find ourselves in. A very well-written book, for pretty much all ages, one that is fun, and full of information.

This is a wonderful book. Written by Yossi Yovel, a professor of biology at Tel-Aviv University who has made an academic career out of the subject of its title, the book is at once engaging popular science book, a history of its field, and autobiography. Each chapter focusses on a particular species or group of bats, their evolved features and behaviors, the (often wild, but sometimes urban) natural habitats they live in, as well as the larger biological concepts at play. The distinctive capabilities of bats, namely flight and echolocation, are treated in depth, but in a manner that is accessible to nonspecialists and thoroughly spellbinding if you have even the slightest curiosity about how the natural world works. The broader biological topics, such as ecology, sociality, perception and neurobiology, and evolutionary dynamics (such as the predator/prey arms races) are explained and illustrated beautifully.
What makes the book more than just a fascinating popular science monograph, however, is the human dimension. Science is always also a social phenomenon and a personal undertaking for the people involved. Yovel’s narrative skillfully interleaves the science with historical background and autobiographical anecdotes. A typical chapter neatly wraps three narrative threads: an exposition of scientific questions and findings, a historical account of how knowledge on the relevant topics was uncovered, often involving rivalries between pioneers in the field, and a personal account of how the author has himself contributed to the field, first as a student, later as a postdoctoral researcher and professor. The personal anecdotes often include vivid accounts of personal interactions with colleagues and said scientific pioneers, or bits of travelogue about expeditions to the remote habitats of various bat populations. The message that comes across is clear: biological science is not just the dry accumulation of knowledge, but a human endeavor full of excitement, disappointments, and interpersonal engagements and relationships.
The writing never tries to dumb down the science, is easygoing and never academic or didactic in tone, and is far from dry. In fact, the only dry aspect is the humor that is sprinkled throughout, such as when Yovel describes how eminent bat researcher Gareth Jones lands on bats as his eventual subject of investigation. While studying birds, he accidentally catches some bats in his net: “It was his first bat experience. It’s not clear who fell into whose net, Jones or the bat.” With this book, Yovel entices the reader to get caught up in his own mesh of narratives about bats and bat scientists, with most pleasurable results.

I definitely found bats interesting before this book, but it really helped me to become next level interested for sure! This one is written in such a way that people without a biology or ecology background can really understand. It's approachable and interesting. Interspersed through some of the more scientific portions is more story/novel portions, so it keeps the reader from getting bogged down. I read this one over a long stretch due to being a slow ebook reader, but it helped me to savor it. My only criticism is that I don't think the insert of bats came with this ebook, or if it did, it's not easy to figure out where it is. While not a huge issue, my phone search history definitely has a lot of bat species in it now! Absolutely have already recommended this one to several friends for when it comes out. Would definitely be interested in other books by this author, related to bats or no, as this one was thoroughly enjoyable!

A very informative nonfiction book that looks at so many different aspects of bats from their eating, where they live, etc. It is an accessible nonfiction book good for both people who know nothing about bats and those that do. It left me wanting to learn more about bats and the different research studies they have been a part of.

Thank you to the author, publisher, Source Book and Net Galley for providing an ARC.

This book was offered to rather than me requesting it. I don't dislike bats, but I probably wouldn't have chosen to read this on my own. However, this was an interesting read. The author promises to convince the reader that bats aren't just scary flying creatures. Job well done! I learned a lot about bats with this book, the sizes and temperaments, the sounds they make and how they fly.
This book did get technical at times, but it was well done for talking about bat research in an interesting way.

4 stars, highly recommended to anyone who wishes to learn more about bats, enjoys non fiction about animals or just wants to learn something new.

Bats are interesting creatures with a bad reputation created by fear and I was hoping this narrative would be a fully developed general understanding about bats. This read as some cool bat facts written with praise for lecturers, researchers, and how bats interact across a few locations. There was a consistent boomerang back and forth between different exclamation about points made about bats without research to substantiate the author’s purpose in discussing bats. This narrative is read well as a literature review and career review more than a book that covers everything bats. The narrative needs better structure and a better thesis statement that focuses on everything about bats beyond echolocation.
There were some interesting moments in the book. What really stood out is the way the occupied Palestine conflict was thrown into one chapter of the book. In a book about bats I would find this quite peculiar. There was a mention that they were accused of wanting to toss these bats at Palestinians and how the author would never put bats at risk of their conflict. This was unnecessary and did nothing to serve the book. Furthermore, it is weird to place this midway in the book when we are talking about bats in Trinidad, than South Asia, and then jumped to Israel with no transitions. It was difficult to understand the purpose of why we, the readers, are learning about bats in this way. Thank you St. Martin’s Press and Netgalley for this free advanced digital copy in exchange for an honest review.
Read more recommendations, ARC impressions, and reviews onhttps://brujerialibrary.wordpress.com/

I love bats. I loved this book. So why no fifth star?

Because at the end of it all, I'm left with the feeling that I don't really know how to describe this book to others. The narrative itself while sort of stuffed into four broad categories (Sociality, Echolocation, Evolution, Nature Conservation) manages to wander about in a way that might put off other readers. Personally, I quite enjoyed this almost information-by-associations-style approach as it kept a lot of the new information feeling fresh and interesting, but for someone who wants a bit more structure a "just the facts" approach, the weaving in and out of the author's personal sojourns in-between cool bat facts could be grating.

I suppose that's the best way to describe this book: it is a lot of really cool bat facts. I also LOVE that Yovel specifically talks about the various areas of research that are still ongoing, something that I think is very important; as a child, I got it into my head that scientists speak so authoritatively on subjects because they have learned all that there is to learn, so there wasn't really anything left to discover. Books like this that make it clear that there is still so much to learn while explaining all that we presently know and how we know it make me happy - if past generations had left a bit more room for wonder like Yovel does in this book, I might have been something of a scientist myself.

But personal musings aside, bats are cool, this is an excellent book to learn more about them, it's a fun book to look at all the cute (and not so cute - somebody help my poor boy the wrinkle faced bat) bats, and if nonfiction isn't your thing, Yovel does just enough to make this feel personable without dumbing down or diluting the information.

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for advanced access to this book scheduled to be published October 7th, 2025 at time of writing.