The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration Into the Wonder of Consciousness Hardcover – 21 May 2015

A great book if you want to learn loads about octopuses, and let's face it – who wouldn't, octopuses are cool. Actually, they are way cooler and stranger than I had ever imagined. The author weaves her tale about her encounters, not just with octopuses at the New England Aquarium in Boston, but their human carers, with references to scientific papers, classical text, and works of philosophy and psychology. It is a remarkably complete and wide-ranging view of the octopus from just about every angle. And the informal conversational style makes it very readable too. It tries to get as close as t possible to trying to understand the emotional inner life of the octopus without anthropomorphising. I am not sure it entirely succeeds in this, there is plenty sentimentality, especially towards the end. For me, the big elephant in the room, lightly glossed over from time to time, was the whole issue around capturing such an intelligent animal from the wild and keeping it in a fairly barren and unstimulating aquarium (or pickle barrel!!). The octopuses are able to solve puzzles quickly and have complex social interactions with people, most of their time is spent in the unchanging environment of the aquarium. How this might affect them is difficult to say as the way they experience the world is quite different from us, but I felt this topic should have been tackled rather than brushed off.On the upside I now know for sure what the plural of octopus is and I am never likely to forget

This is a really lovely book and quite an incredible story. It is easy to read and has been a good escape on my lunch and on busy days, leaving me with a constant stream of questions about consciousness, inter-species communication. I'm now hungry to find out more! Since my last visit to a large aquarium I have been fascinated by octopuses, and this book has deepened and strengthened my love for them, along with all sea creatures, and made me feel so much more connected to their world.

This is a well-written book exploring the world of octopuses, chiefly the giant pacific octopuses that live in the New England aquarium. The author takes us on a journey through her own discovery of these amazing animals - she even learns to scuba dive in order to gain a deeper (pardon the pun) understanding of their world. It's not a purely technical book through as there are long asides about the people working in the aquarium and their relationships to the world around them.The book suffers from a degree of repetition:"They lay strands of eggs that look like grains of rice""She is protecting all those eggs, each of which is only the size of a grain of rice""Octopuses grow from the size of a grain of rice""Hatching from an egg the size of a grain of rice, one can grow both longer and heavier than a man in three years."Yeah, we get the grain of rice thing! Enough already!The book also strays into some slightly dodgy territory when the author religion and the "soul" of the octopus, and when she dips into anthropomorphism and tells us, with no evidence (because how could there be?) "we knew in that moment that Octavia had not only remembered us and recognized us; she had wanted to touch us again."

Loved this book. Had no idea that octopuses (yes that's the correct way to spell the plural) could be so interesting. Like aliens from our own planet. Octopuses and us split in the evolutionary tree of live about 500 million years ago and they have developed their own type of intelligence. Very easy to read. Difficult in fact to put down. You will never eat octopus again when you realise how amazing they are.

The blurb promises a classic girl meets octopus story. And it is. Only at the end, you will have learned a lot about the girl and very little about the octopus.

This is a truly marvellous book as moving as it is scientifically informing. The octopus has always fascinated me and this book has only deepened that fascination so much so that on completion I enrolled on a marine and Antartic aquatic course.Buy this book. It’s wonderful.

A lovely book, told in beautiful prose. I learnt a lot about the octopus. I have never really thought about their lives before, but it helped me to see nature differently and with more compassion. I judge a book to be good if at the end I feel I have learnt something about life that would help me to be better and I felt that with this book.

A good read but too many anecdotes and not enough science