This is an utterly fascinating read. It turned out to be a lot more technical (phonetics and linguistics) than what I anticipated but was no less entertaining for this. If you live with a cat and want to gain a better understanding of what they are on about, then this could well be for you. Indeed, if you live with any creature which makes sounds in your direction, this may well provide you with a starting point for greater understanding. But this isn't a cute little book for cat lovers; it is a serious piece of academic research.

I struggled with The Secret Language of Cats. Being owned by three cats I thought this would be right up my street but I just could not get into it.

As a cat owner, I was very disappointed with this book. I thought this would be a genuine study, of cat behaviour and language, to help owners understand their cats needs better. I barely got past the first third of book before I gave up.

As a cat lover I expected this book to help me understand my pet more but I found it to be too technical and skipped a lot of it

I’m sorry to say I really wasn’t impressed with this - it read like a very dry thesis and I struggled to engage with it from the beginning and throughout! As a cat lover and owner I’m always reading articles about cat behaviour in an attempt to understand these mysterious creatures better but this gave me nothing and I struggled to see the point of publishing this for a general audience. I’d say its main fault was that it was far too specific to the author and although I realise this was what her research was primarily based on it just didn’t feel relevant to me. A lot of her findings were common sense and a lot of them were presumptive. One of the few books on cats I wouldn’t recommend I have to say.

A fascinating look at the language of cats. There's quite a lot of in depth work on how cats form their sounds and what they could possibly mean. At times it went a little beyond me but for the most part, it was an informative read with the author relating some of the experiences with her own cats. I thought it was especially interesting that someone with an unusual voice could find their cat trying to mimic their way of talking. It has definitely made me determined to see if I can figure out what my three cats are 'saying' to me with their miaows, trills, and chirrups. A good read for all cat owners out there.

Thanks to NetGalley and publishers, HarperCollins UK / HQ, for the opportunity to review an ARC.

As a cat lover I loved reading this book it had so many interesting insights and facts in it. Definitely a must read for any cat lover.

Having been a cat lover for longer than I care to remember, I always enjoy books that can shed light on their behaviour, and here the author specifically explores how cats communicate. This is a serious non-fiction title which discusses numerous studies and research documents on the intricacies of the language cats use, both between themselves and another cat and that directed at us humans. There are many books out there about felines that are fun, lighthearted and laugh-out-loud funny, and this may be mistaken for one of those. Make no mistake, this is an intriguing and informative analysis of how our furry friends communicate, written by a phoneticist, and although it reads rather like a thesis, I found it thoroughly engaging and interesting throughout.

Due to the scientific approach this book takes, it is certainly more of a niche reading choice, so if you're looking for a humorous gift for a cat lover or a coffee table book, I would look elsewhere. This is for those who are interested in animal behaviour or for those who wish to understand more about how cats communicate and what each sound they make conveys. The Secret Language of Cats was right up my street. Superb!

Many thanks to HQ for an ARC. I was not required to post a review, and all thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.

I am wavering between 3 and 4 stars for this but as the version I read had a bit more of a cartoonish cover, I was expecting something a little less dry than what I actually got, so have rounded the 3.5 stars I give it down.. Don't get me wrong, it was interesting and I did go with the flow and made a right fool of myself when I tried things out on Malcolm-cat, but on the whole, I expected maybe a lighter sort of delivery. Malcolm being a shared cat - he is a stray and my household share duties with a neighbour - he often does have a lot to say for himself but he is also more a cat of show rather than tell, for example, he will sit in front of the fridge when he is hungry. On the flip side, when flea-spot time is nigh, he vocally creates merry hell, snarling and spitting the most guttural of noises, quite possibly swearing in cat language!
He also has his little gang of neighbourhood cats, two of which are a bit screechy in themselves so, it was interesting to read the parts where she talks about cats communicating with each other. I've always wondered what they all get up to when they get together, specifically what they are all plotting about doing secret, special cat things, as they do. But to be brutally honest, I am not really sure I want to know...
All in all, although I found parts of this book extremely readable and indeed fascinating, I don't think it has really opened my eyes to anything I didn't really already know about Malcolm's communication with me. He growls when I annoy him, he miaows when he wants food, treats, love or cuddles, he purrs when he's happy, snores when he's asleep, and he bites when he wants me to leave him alone. I'm not really sure there's any more I really need to know.
My thanks go to the Publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read this book.

The Secret Language of Cats is something…well, a bit different. The title says it all — a scientific exploration of the sounds our feline friends make, how they make them and what they (might) mean by it. The author, Susanne Schötz, is a lecturer in phonetics and the book relies on real (if small-scale) research.

If I’m honest, a lot of the technical side went way over my head, even though I have a nodding acquaintance with the discipline of phonetics (by which I mean I know my labials from my bilabials and can demonstrate a glottal stop). But what might have been a dull and dry piece of writing is more than saved by the author’s cats. Five domestic felines and a selection of others passing through all contrived, as cats always do, to steal the show.

The book looks at the very many sounds that cats make and is supported by web links which didn’t show up in the ARC I received, so it’s hard to judge how effective they might actually be. And I think it would require a lot of interest and effort to get the best out of this book. There are extensive appendices so that if you aren’t familiar with phonetics you can look them up and try and work out how the vocalisations she describes might actually sound, but there are very many subtle variations and it isn’t easy to pick them all up.

That said, I have a suspicion that the best of this book, if it’s used with the associated resources and with a suitably co-operative cat (mine doesn’t say much, except at night, and remained resolutely silent throughout my reading), would be very rewarding indeed. Schötz demonstrated how her cats use the same sounds in different ways, such as how we can listen for the subtle differences between the purrs a cat makes when it’s comfortable and those it makes when it’s in pain, and how cats vocalise in their territorial battles as a way to avoid confrontation.

It’s probably the ideal book for cat owners with a grasp of phonetics and a more subtle ear than I have, but I learned a lot from the author’s cats and I already listen to my own cat — a notorious non-purrer and night-howler — in a different way. I enjoyed it far more than I thought I would when I began reading it.

What makes The Secret Language of Cats stand out a little more from other books on the subject is that it takes a more scientific approach which I quite liked. While I have to admit, I did expect the book to be a bit more throwaway, I found Schötz's odd mixture of linguistics and stories relating to her love of cats palatable as well as interesting.


With thanks to Netgalley and Harpercollins for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I'm known as the cat lady among my friends due to my love of cats so i loved reading this and learning more about the meanings behind cats little noises and body languages.

A great book for any cat lover! Being the owner of two cats myself, I was interested in this book to see what it was all about. I have to admit I did think it was going to be along the lines of a Christmas stocking filler type book – short and sweet with funny little diagrams and a few words of wisdom! Wrong!! This is a proper, well researched and interesting book! It goes into great detail the noises cats make, why they make them and what they could all possibly mean. I did get some strange looks from my cats trying out some of these noises….and also from my husband and son come to think of it.

In all seriousness, it was an interesting book, but I didn’t honestly think that there was that much that could be written about the noises a cat makes, so for me the book did drag on a little bit. As for my cats – did it make me understand them any better? To be honest, I think I already understood what most of their noises mean – “I’m hungry”, “let me out” and “yep, that’s the spot” are the usual ones! A good book for the more serious of cat lovers though!

Honestly I think I was expecting a humorous take on communicating with your cat, rather than a serious, scientific treatise on cat communication. It is a decent book, very thorough and if your interest lies in cats or animal behaviour, you'll probably enjoy it. However if you are a cat owner of any experience then it's not going to tell you anything you won't have already noticed yourself. Interesting but ultimately didn't really add anything for me personally.

This was a fascinating read! I was expecting a slim book along the lines of the stocking fillers you see at Christmas, with a few tips about cat body language and purring, but I was completely wrong. This is a book of linguistic analysis of cat noises, complete with diagrams, written by a cat-loving phoneticist, and it's really really interesting. There's an excellent balance between the slice-of-life elements about the author's five current cats and many previous cats, and the more scientific exploration of the noises they make. You can tell the author really loves her feline family, which makes this a joy to read.

I think its scientific approach will make this book very niche, but it happens to tick two of my boxes (cats and linguistics), so I loved it, and I think anyone interested in either subject would find it interesting. I found myself making a lot of cat noises out loud while reading!

Loving cats as I do and wanting to better my communication with George N Mildred I was keen to read this interesting looking book
I was expecting ( via the cover ) a jaunty, maybe humorous and ‘light’ approach to ‘talking to cats’ and was, I thought, going to have a LOL read and then be able to chat about the intricate plot points of ‘The Bodyguard’ with G and M 😃
Nothing could have been further from the truth, this is a serious document on the authors work re cat communication, it details ( and I mean details ) cat vowels and consonants and what EVERY nuance of a cat sound can mean!!
This is done via personal stories, graphs, intricate analysis, appendixes and a link to ‘listen’ to the various sounds!
The author is, by trade, a phonetics professor and this shows as the book is more like a reference manual for University than a book to relax and enjoy
There are inaccuracies in the book, for example, the author tells us ( over many pages ) how she gets up and the first thing she does is feed her 5 cats and how they all greet her....only later to state she has a routine when she gets up and doesnt feed her cats until she has had her breakfast etc, this was a glaring difference in facts and imo does matter in a book, any book
There are the occasional ‘funny’ bits about her cats but far and few between
The only bits I really understood were the bits we all know, and you really dont need 15 pages on when a cat spits its angry or when a cat miaows near food its hungry!!!
Its a very clinical book BUT unfortunately tells you nothing that a cat owner wont already know
I guess the problem is a book like this, being daft humans means we think it is going to open up a whole world with our cats that we never knew existed, of course its not, none the less its a major disappointment it doesnt!!
Is not really, imo, a book for the cat lover unless you are specifically interested in going into great great minutia on the subject and even then being none the wiser!