Well, dead and cooked is never the best way to get to know someone. So, I kind of think it’s a waste of a perfectly good friendship to cook and eat them. But chickens are the one bird that even if you can’t recognize a crow, even if you can’t recognize a robin, people can identify a chicken. But even though we recognize them, and everyone thinks they know a chicken, people underestimate them all the time. Chickens have a lot of wonderful things about them, but to me, the most wonderful of all is their company, and being able to travel in the chicken universe, and be able to see that even in this, you know, commonest of creatures that everyone can recognize, there is still like mystery and excitement. There’s still a soul there. Each animal is highly individual, and we have so much to learn from them.
― Sy Montgomery, Interview, Living on Earth
What booksellers are saying about What the Chicken Knows
- I loved this book! It always appeared to me that my dog had a friendship with one of the chickens who lived next door. And now I know he probably did. Sy Montgomery is so adept at describing animal behavior in a way that illuminates without anthropomorphizing. Another great read.
― Liz Feeney, E. Shaver, Bookseller in Savannah, Georgia | BUY
- Pretty much everything I’ve ever learned about chickens I learned here. Montgomery’s simple, personal prose makes this short book on keeping, raising, and understanding chickens a pleasure even for those of us stuck in urban sprawl without even a window-box. Short, and very sweet.
― Doron Klemer, Octavia Books LLC in New Orleans, Louisiana | BUY
- Sy Montgomery takes us on a fascinating journey that’s enjoyable, humorous and educational and I definitely learned a lot! I had no idea that chickens were so intelligent and complex. Apparently they know us humans far better than we know them. All of the specific details she shared were quite interesting. They can make up to 24 sounds each having a specific meaning. I personally would have never thought to hug a rooster. I now have a new-found love for chickens and I recommend this book to everyone, especially animal lovers. 5 stars!
― Sandra Pinkney, Underground Books in Carrollton, Georgia | BUY
- Sy Montgomery works her magic again, this time with chickens. With animal shelters overrun with post-pandemic abandoned birds, Montgomery shares her life with chickens once again giving a sense of our shared nature with our fellow creatures.
― Jan Blodgett, Main Street Books in Davidson, North Carolina | BUY
- While I’ve had backyard chickens for about five years, Sy Montgomery’s book What the Chicken Knows: A New Appreciation of the World’s Most Familiar Bird made me realize how much I didn’t know about my flock. This short book was a delight, filled with personal stories of chickens and their human keepers. Read this if you’re thinking about getting your own flock or are just chicken-curious.
― Rachel Watkins, Avid Bookshop in Athens, Georgia | BUY
About Sy Montgomery
Sy Montgomery is a naturalist, adventurer, and author of more than thirty acclaimed books of nonfiction for adults and children, including The Hummingbirds’ Gift, The Hawk’s Way, the National Book Award finalist The Soul of an Octopus, and most recently, Of Time and Turtles, which was a New York Times bestseller. The recipient of numerous honors, including lifetime achievement awards from the Humane Society and the New England Booksellers Association, she lives in New Hampshire with her husband, writer Howard Mansfield, and a border collie.
Bess Kalb is an Emmy-nominated comedy writer and the bestselling author of Nobody Will Tell You This but Me, a New York Times Editor’s Choice. She wrote for eight years on Jimmy Kimmel Live! and has written for the Emmy Awards, the Academy Awards, and the 2020 Democratic National Convention. She is the head writer and executive producer of the WGA Award-nominated Yearly Departed, and is currently adapting Nobody Will Tell You This but Me into a feature film with Sight Unseen Pictures. She lives with her husband and two boys in Brooklyn. This is her debut picture book.
Erin Kraan is a children’s book illustrator, woodcutter, and printmaker. She loves the process of carving her characters into wood and seeing how their quirky and whimsical identities come to life through the ink in the prints. Erin lives and works in Vancouver, British Columbia.
