Thank you to NetGalley for this e-ARC.

As a child who grew up rarely, if ever, seeing a bat...this novel taught me the effort it takes just to study them!

The opening of this novel especially highlights the challenges of studying a flying mammal that travels under the cover of night. While technology has certainly made leaps and bounds, there are still complications that arise with its use.

Bats, to me, represent the unknown. And this novel endeavors to explore that.

Bats are my absolute favorite, and I will never pass up an opportunity to learn more about them! This was a little more focused on researchers than I expected, but it was still very informative and a good read overall. I would happily add it to my collection.

If you’re not a fan of bats (for whatever your reasons are) then check out this book.
If you knew little about them then check out this book.
If you love bats, check this out.

I suspect everyone who picks up this book falls into one of two camps: those who already love bats and are eager to know more, or those who hate them—know thy enemy, as they say.

I’m firmly in the former category. While I wouldn’t exactly welcome one swooping into my personal space, I’m more than happy to admire these adorable and fascinating little mammals from a safe distance. My bat knowledge before this was a mix of basic biology classes, a respectable stack of vampire novels, and Ace Ventura, who taught me the meaning of “guano.”

Yossi Yovel starts with the societal structures of different bat species before diving into echolocation, evolution, and conservation efforts (or, more often, humanity’s ongoing attempts to rid themselves of them). Interestingly and ironically, these eradication efforts occasionally aligned with the goals of researchers and provided unexpected opportunities to learn more.

The result is a captivating and humorous exploration of bats and the researchers who have devoted their lives and careers to studying them.

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin’s Press, and Yossi Yovel for this ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

I do not like bats. Which is precisely why I wanted to read this book. The author promises to convince the reader that bats are more than just scary flying creatures. Much to my surprise, he succeeded! Wow! I had no idea how much there is to know about bats, or how many kinds of bats there are. I learned that bats come in different sizes, that some are social and travel in groups, while some would prefer to be left alone. There are bats so tiny they might perch on the end of your nose (I hope this never happens to me!). Some bats screech, some sing, and some honk. Some bats skitter across the ground using the tips of their wings like legs. There are bats that eat fish, although most bats eat insects. I even enjoyed learning more about insects, who have ears in all kinds of strange places. And my hometown of Green River, Wyoming was even mentioned as a great place to find fossilized insects.

The most fascinating thing I learned is that female bats can delay fertilization by storing sperm in their reproductive tract until they're ready to become pregnant. What a convenient and wonderful notion! Although this book was occasionally technical, the author does a wonderful job of talking about bat research in an engaging, interesting way. The often humorous anecdotes about his travel experiences and fellow researchers made the humans in this book almost as interesting as the bats. I still think bats are scary flying creatures, but concede that they are, indeed, so much more than that! An enthusiastic 4 stars.

Thank you NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the advanced digital copy of this book.

I love bats and I loved learning more about them in this detailed, conversational book. I personally will never travel into a jungle or swamp or bat cave to hang out with bats, but I loved getting to read about Yovel's experiences doing exactly those things. Bats are remarkable animals, and never in a million years would I have thought about how they experience gravity or that they use their nostrils for more than smelling. Some of Yovel's anecdotes are a little off topic (some are way off topic), but most are bat-related in at least some way. The meat of the book--all of the history of learning about the bat--is fantastic,

Great Concept in Bat-Science Mishandled by Digressions
Yossi Yovel, The Genius Bat: The Secret Life of the Only Flying Mammal (New York: St. Martin’s Press, October 7, 2025). Hardcover: $32, 320pp. ISBN: 978-1-250378-44-6.
***
“With nearly 1500 species, bats account for more than twenty percent of mammalian species. The most successful and most diverse group of mammals, bats come in different sizes, shapes, and colors, from the tiny bumblebee bat to the giant golden-crowned flying fox. Some bats eat fruit and nectar; others eat frogs, scorpions, or fish. Vampire bats feed on blood. Bats are the only mammals that can fly; their fingers have elongated through evolution to become wings with a unique, super-flexible skin membrane stretched between them. Their robust immune system is one of the reasons for their extreme longevity. A tiny bat can live for forty years. Yossi Yovel, an ecologist and a neurobiologist, is passionate about deciphering the secrets of bats, including using AI to decipher their communication… From muddy rainforests to star-covered night deserts, from guest houses in Thailand to museum drawers full of fossils in New York, this is an eye-opening and entertaining account of a mighty mammal.”
Most of the details in this blurb are things I have not heard before. Bats make up 25% of mammals? Amazing. Most blurbs exaggerate the significance of their subject, but these facts are justly worthy of amazement.
Though the intensity is dampened in the “Introduction” that starts with generalities about animals in Israel before explaining that the author is waiting in the hot morning to see bats. Then some more facts, and then the author continues complaining about the early hour. My edition does not have a table-of-contents, so I do not know how exactly this book is divided. “Part One: Sociability” explains a bit. There is a digital table in this eBook. The other parts are on: Echolocation, Evolution, and Nature Conservation. This is a logical division: courting, hunting, vampirism, language, and other topics are isolated into chapters so those with interest in individual topics can follow these. A bit too much space is given to echolocation and how this system evolved, but I guess this is the main point-of-interest for bat-types.
The animal-language section interested me. It begins by explaining that human language depends on firm rules of syntax, whereas other animals seem to “lack this capacity”. Though there is an “ability of a bird or monkey species to combine pairs of signals to create a meaningful sequence.” Examples include how birds combine signals to both search and converge during a hunt. Instead of explaining the difference in this system in bats, the author digresses into discussing how he wanted to generally “understand animals” when he was a child: this is a highly annoying digression. After this there is finally an explanation that bats “have an enormous range of communication signals… short and stereotypical…, long or short, whistling or chirping, ultrasonic or audible.” But then he digresses again to explain he personally bird a bat “that wailed like a cat”. This is confusing whereas it would have been clearer to explain statistics, or verified facts about what bats specifically sound like cats.
It would be near-impossible for a reader to get through this book cover-to-cover given these leaps from science into general reflections. Scientists would not tolerate so many uncertainties, and unscientific anecdotes, and those who are searching for action or narrative would be distracted by bursts of science. There are some interesting places, but I generally do not recommend this book.
--Pennsylvania Literary Journal: https://anaphoraliterary.com/journals/plj/plj-excerpts/book-reviews-summer-2025/

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an early copy of this book! Below is my honest review.

A very informative, data-heavy, research-heavy book! I didn't know there was so much more to learn about bats. This is not an easy read. It's dense with information and stories, so if you wanted some quick learning, this is not for you. BUT if you are interested in the history of bats and what kind of studies were done to learn more about them, this is a book for you. Fun facts I've learned:

- Bats are (mostly) altruistic, even to bats they don't know.
- We know a lot about echolocation, but we also don't know a lot about echolocation.
- A lot of female bats congregate in their own community while male bats like to make their own.
- Bats can tell which distance is shorter between two items by a difference of 1.5 cm.
- Bats only reproduce about once a year.

I hope you pick this one up because it was a fascinating book to read!

Technology has come a long way since Mervin Tuttle wrote his groundbreaking “The Secret Lives of Bats.” “The Genius Bat” is a significant step forward and yet there is still so much to learn. Yovel presents an overview of chiropterology (the science of bats- I learned that term here). It doesn’t go too deep into any one subject, but offers a wide variety of information, from biology, genetics, evolution, fossils, threats, etc. My favorite part, as always, is the ethology. What bats do and how they do it, as well as the author’s personal experiences with these fascinating creatures. Has he been bitten? You bet. How hard is it to trap them? What can you do when a deadly fungus threatens them? Yovel explains the technological advances that have revolutionized the field. He reminisces about the hacks that he and his colleagues had to come up with in order to study their subjects. The successes, mistakes, heartbreaks and anecdotes are all very interesting, and the author introduces many of the people he calls “heroes” for their contributions and support to these flying mammals. The book is maybe a little too long, learning about the careers of all the scientists is interesting, but I was in it for the bats. Anyone interested in learning the most up to date information should pick this up.
I chose to read this book and all opinions in this review are my own and completely unbiased. Thank you, NetGalley/St. Martin's Press.

I really enjoyed this book. It had enough science in it to satisfy those who are involved in the study of mammals, especially bats, but also included detailed explanations of experiments that were done and why. Bats are amazing creatures. I had no idea there were so many species and that many were indigenous to very specific to regions of the world. The author included many personal stories about studies he was involved in as well as studies conducted by other bat scientists. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in bat behavior, the evolution of bats that use echolocation, the amazing things that bats are capable of doing while flying around in the dark, and learning more about the many wonders of this very misunderstood flying mammal.

I love bats, this should have been a five star read for me. It’s interesting, it’s full of researcher anecdotes, some facts which makes it a fairly quick read. The biggest issues I had with the books is the way it’s put together, it suffers an identity crisis and the work itself is weaker for it. I do think when it’s published and we get all the pictures etc it will help overall. However the book just didn’t know whether it was a researcher diary or what.

I do think it’s easy to read and accessible which is great! I did enjoy what I learned, some of the overall pieces just don’t feel as cohesive which takes a stat away for me.


Thank you NetGalley for this ARC!

Reading “The Genius Bat: The Secret Life of the Only Flying Mammal” is like having Yossi Yovel sitting next to you, recounting all the amazing things he’s learned about bats. Yovel could also tell you facts about shrews, moths, and other creatures that you probably never learned in school. He doesn’t limit himself to his own research. Yovel has traveled all over the world for his research and includes what he’s learned from other bat experts.

The book runs about 320 pages but seems shorter. Yovel is someone who loves his subject and wants you to love it, too. He spent over 10 years writing it.

You’ve heard about echolocation, but there’s more. You don’t have to be a bat to echolocate. If you’re a moth, you may have an ear on your chest. If you’re a certain type of male bat, you may nurse your pups.

“The Genius Bat” is a fascinating book and I wholeheartedly recommend it. Thank you to NetGalley for the advance reader’s copy. This is my honest review.

The Genius Bat by Yossi Yovel combines research with a story of his study of various kinds of bats. There are many interesting facts sprinkled in of the overwhelming number of bats that he worked with during his career so far. While this isn't a normal topic for me, I enjoyed each different place and type of bat that he wrote about. How bats survive, mate, find food, live and how immensely far that they fly each night in search of it all. This book is put together very thoughtfully and has a lot of information for those interested in the fascinating world of bats.

Thank you to St. Martin Press for the advanced reader copy in exchange for my honest review.

This book was excellent and extremely informative of the cultural scientific aspect of the life of bats. I loved learning about these mammals and their many different species within the category of bats. The writing style lured me in, like a fish to a worm on a hook. ❤️‍🩹

I loved the idea of the book because I think bats are so fascinating, and, if well-written, books like this can be a fascinating dive into science and nature. The sticking point for me, however, was the science part of it. Yovel makes it too "sciency" for the average layperson, in my opinion. I kept trying to skip through the more rambling sections with mind-numbingly detailed descriptions of experiments, but there was no relief. It was endless, so I finally gave up.

“What is it like to be a bat?” asks Thomas Nagel in a famous 1974 article. Well, this book will tell you!
Yossi Yovel’s new book, The Genius Bat, which was ten years in the making, tells the story. He covers echolocation,(of course), evolution, nature conservation and the social life of bats through stories about the world wide research and the scientists who have been working on this since the mid-twentieth century. It’s a fascinating tale.
The physics is clearly explained and he makes you feel a part of the world of bat research.
Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I’m one of those people that don’t know much about bats other than I like to stay away from them.
I was very pleasantly surprised with all the information in this book about bats. The author did a great job with telling so much about the bats and not making it boring. I have a newfound appreciation of them now. I had no idea there were so many different kinds of bats. I did know that bats eat lots of insects. I cheer them on when they fly overhead in my backyard in the evening.
I’m glad I read this book. It really throws light on how much environment and our encroachment plays into the animal kingdom.
I received a complimentary copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

This is a very informative book about bats. Bats are such a large and interesting group of mammals! The Genius Bat delves deep into the current research about bats: how they communicate, how they use echolocation, and how they help each other, among other topics. I liked the authors writing style; despite reporting on scientific research and findings, the tone was conversational and easy to read. Anyone who is curious about bats or about how animals live will find this book fascinating! Thank you to NetGalley for and advanced copy in return for my honest opinion.

The Genius Bat left me feeling blind as a bat. The book reads like a hybrid of doctoral thesis, lab gossip and travel blog. That is so much raw material to build endlessly entertaining and engaging writing from and yet the combination ultimately falls flat. Despite the potential for a compelling narrative, it ends up as a disjointed collection of facts and events. Even the most extraordinary stories are presented in a way that fails to animate them for the reader.

The author’s expertise in the history and practice of bat research is undeniable. However, I found myself wishing for stronger editorial guidance to shape these insights into an overarching storyline. Instead, it’s like you’re the partner living with a grad student getting drips and drabs of research breakthroughs, conference highlights and scattered inside jokes. But there’s never enough to fully understand the bigger picture. I kept hoping for a cohesive thread to tie the material together, but that clarity never came.

The technical details are clearly and accessibly explained, making aspects of bat research understandable for any reader. Sadly, the galley version I received didn’t include the oft-referenced photos of adorable bat faces, which I was longing to see.

I must confess I am biased, I love bats! That being said, I enjoyed this book very much, I found it fascinating and learned so much about bats. I will definitely be purchasing a hard copy for my shelves.

Thank you to Netgalley and publisher for providing an E- Arc.