The Book of Beasts: Reclaiming Animal Wisdom

by Elizabeth Sulis Kim

A modern bestiary with an ancient heart, meet twelve emblematic animals and restore your relationship with the natural world.

The Bear King and Queen who’ll rise from sleep; the Salmon of Wisdom who gifts understanding of the universe’s past, present and future; the Lion Man carved 40,000 years ago. Join Elizabeth Sulis Kim as she travels across the globe from our deep past into the future, bringing together the animals which have captivated us for millennia.

Steeped in folklore, mythology, magic and religion, The Book of Beasts tells the story of our shapeshifting relationships with animals, from reverence to persecution, from friendship to fear, from awe to indifference. It asks us what we actually know about the creatures we share this world with – and offers us a different way of living together.

Genres: Nonfiction

352 pages, Hardcover

Published August 6, 2026

About the author

Elizabeth Sulis Kim is founding editor of Cunning Folk, the popular independent magazine about magic, mythology, folklore and the occult. Cunning Folk has many influential fans and always quickly sells out its first printing, reprinting frequently. Elizabeth’s writing has appeared in various publications, including BBC Culture, The Guardian, The Independent, Refinery29, and the LA Review of Books.

Reviews

[Pudsey Recommends]

I loved immersing myself in Elizabeth Sulis Kim’s The Book of Beasts. This is a book about animals, yes, but it is just as much about us: what the stories we tell about animals reveal about being human, and how we might reclaim a more holistic, less destructive way of living alongside them. Her prose is intelligent, playful and wonderfully accessible, underpinned by an extraordinary amount of research.

Sulis Kim takes us through literature, folklore, mythology, history and science, asking some fascinating and often unexpected questions along the way. Why has the wolf been so thoroughly vilified while the bear has had a rather better rebrand? What might bears have to do with the folklore of King Arthur? Why are witches so often accompanied by cats? It turns out some animals simply have better marketing than others. In the process, she dismantles centuries of ingrained prejudice surrounding these so-called ‘beasts’, and asks us to question how much of what we think we know about them is really about us.

But underneath the rich storytelling is something much more urgent. Again and again, Sulis Kim shows how we have turned living creatures into symbols, commodities, pests or products, and how easily that allows us to stop seeing the animal itself. There is some difficult reading here, and she doesn't shy away from the cruelty humans have inflicted on other species.

The chapter on whales and cetaceans made me cry. I hadn’t known the heartbreaking story behind Keiko, the orca who starred in Free Willy: after years in captivity and a high-profile release, he struggled to reintegrate with wild orcas, sought human company, and died of pneumonia at 27.

By the time we’ve moved through all twelve beasts, from bears to whales, there is still a surprising sense of hope. The Book of Beasts is both a homage to the animal kingdom and a warning about what we stand to lose. Sulis Kim reminds us that individual action and systemic change are not mutually exclusive. In a world where the scale of environmental destruction, and the obscene carbon footprints of the super-rich, can make our own choices feel insignificant, she argues that they aren't.

A ripple can become a wave.

This book made me want to look more closely at the creatures we share this world with, but also at ourselves. It brought to mind the Buddhist principle of esho-funi: the inseparability of ourselves and our environment, and the idea that change in one cannot be separated from change in the other. Perhaps changing our relationship with the animal kingdom begins with remembering that we were never really separate from it in the first place.

Huge thanks to Penguin for the advance reader copy. #pudseyrecommends

[M.V.C.]

The Book of Beasts by Elizabeth Kim was an enchanting read. What I gather to be the thesis of the book is that the stories we tell about animals is how we treat them and that the stories can and do change over time. It is equal parts thought provoking, and poetic. It is well researched and I learned many interesting facts, for example about the (overblown) role of different animals in spreading the plague. What I enjoyed most though, were the retellings of fairy tales and myths that Kim masterfully weaves through her personal experiences and sometimes frought feelings about the animals.

[Chase]

Beautiful and well written. Elizabeth masterfully blends storytelling with whit and history, exploring the stories we tell about animals and the stories that they might tell about us. It is gorgeously printed, with a fantastic cover design!

[Kristen Sollee]

Immersive, enchanting, and exquisitely written, The Book of Beasts is a clarion call to rethink and rewild our relationship with animals. Prepare to be changed by this magical book.

[Cristina Ferrandez]

'The Book of Beasts' is a stunning bestiary for our contemporary times, guiding us to reconnect with animals and the natural world in this era of disenchantment.

Divided into 12 chapters (one per animal), the book blends history, folklore and personal accounts to offer fascinating and important insights into how we might view animals differently, coexist better with them, and see aspects of our own nature within them.

The book offers a combination of academic rigour, storytelling and insight and many passages made me truly shift the way I think about animals. I found the book to be inspiring and paradigm shifting, as well as absolutely beautiful, with lovely illustrations.

I would recommend 'The Book of Beasts' to anyone who loves animals and the natural world, although I think everyone would benefit from reading it.