Unlike the elusive real octopus, my book Octopus! The Most Mysterious Creature In the Sea is easy to spot! On its first day out, I already found it hiding a few places around New York City:
Smithsonian Explains 10 Surprising Facts from Octopus!
In honor of the publication of Octopus! The Most Mysterious Creature In the Sea today, Smithsonian.com brings us 10 surprising science facts about the octopus. From their introduction: Octopuses, those whip-smart but bizarre cephalopods, seem to embody everything creepy and mysterious about the sea–the thought of their soft squishy bodies lurking in the oceans’ dark reaches has inspired …
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Octopus! On NBC
I was delighted to hear that NBCNews.com science editor Nidhi Subbaraman is as excited about octopuses as I am! She and I chatted cephalopods a couple days ago, and she's posted a fabulous Q&A on NBCNews.com in advance of Octopus! The Most Mysterious Creature In the Sea's official release tomorrow! As she notes in her intro: Katherine Harmon Courage's first book "OCTOPUS!" is crammed …
Booklist calls Octopus! “entertaining and eyeopening”
Booklist gave Octopus! a great early review! It will be in their October 15 issue--out tomorrow! "Octopuses have been around for 300 million years, surfacing in ancient mythology and various cuisines and currently living the world over in an array of several hundred species that are, to our mammalian eyes, strange, even alien. Courage, an associate editor of Scientific …
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How Do You Build a Robot Octopus?
How do you build a robot octopus? That, it turns out, is a question scientists around the world are racing to answer. And given that octopuses are all squish and smarts--and our robots are hard and, well, developing--it is no small task. But such a bot could be important for search and rescue operations, exploration, …
How the Freaky Octopus Can Help us Understand the Human Brain
In this month's WIRED magazine, my article "Alien Intelligence: How the Freaky Octopus Can Help us Understand the Human Brain," dives into the deeply mysterious octopus brain. This was no easy task, however. The octopus's "smarts" are distributed throughout its body--from its suckers, to its arms, to its central brain--an arrangement researchers refer to as "embodied …
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Octopus! Review in Kirkus
Octopus! got another nice pre-publication review--this time from Kirkus Reviews! It will be in their October issue and is already up online: "Scientific American associate editor Courage explains why the octopus has been beguiling humans for millennia, making an appearance in 'creation myths, art, and, of course, cuisine.' A gourmet treat in Mediterranean countries and found in abundance …
“Recommended” review in Library Journal for Octopus!
Octopus! got a "Recommended" review in this month's Library Journal! Check it out: "Courage (contributing editor, Scientific American) conveys the many attractions and fascinating features of the octopus as she investigates its anatomy, physiology, reproduction, food hunting, and life cycle. Related to squids, cuttlefish, snails, slugs, and oysters, octopuses live all over the world, in shallow water …
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Awesome early blurbs for Octopus!
Octopus! has already received some kind early words from: Carl Zimmer, New York Times science writer and author of A Planet of Viruses and The Tangled Bank: An Introduction to Evolution: "The octopus is like an alternate experiment in intelligent life--sophisticated, alluring, and wholly alien. In her fresh, deeply-reported book, Katherine Harmon Courage makes this creature a little less …
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