Sex on Six Legs: Lessons on Life, Love, and Language from the Insect World by Marlene Zuk

Category: 50 Books

As an artist who finds herself outdoors, in nature, with a camera, quite a lot, I am aware that I have become more patient with and interested in insects and other buggy things. I’m especially interested in dragonflies and damselflies, but I find that bumping into a spider or beetle or bee can be nearly as fascinating. I even mentioned to my husband and some friends the other night that if I were rich and could go back to college I would somehow find a way to major in dragonflies. So when I saw that this book was coming out I thought that since I’m not going back to school anytime soon, I could still read about bugs.

I’m so glad I picked this book up. The title pretty much explains what the book is about. This book was very readable, any time there was science-y jargon in play the author would explain it right away. While most of the tests that were mentioned were on fruit flies, ants, and bees, Ms. Zuk also managed to add some other bugs into the mix like spiders and beetles and even dragonflies get a mention or two. I also enjoyed the vareity of subects that was discussed, while the book is mostly about reproduction, there are also chapters on language and homosexuality and other social buggy things.

Two problems I had with the book are that:
1. When the author would get really detailed about genes and genomes the subject was over my head and I didn’t care to pay close attention to those parts. I realize that’s on me and is not the fault of the author.

2. No pictures. C’mon, it’s a book about bugs. It would have been nice to have some cool close-ups of some bugs, is all.

Still it was a good read that has me even more interested in insects and other bugs. If you are a bug enthusiast or hobbyist, I think you’ll really enjoy the book. It’s worth it for the conversation starters alone.  If you’re not interested at all in bugs, you probably wouldn’t pick up the book anyway.

This book is available 08.02.2011

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