How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World - The Lion in the Living Room

Well-researched and packed with information, yet also lively and engaging thanks to the writer's wry voice. I think this book will appeal not merely to "cat people," but to anyone who is interested in science, history, and how humans relate to other species. I still prefer dogs, but I have a new respect for cats now!

Fascinating peak into the history and current state of affairs of our feline friends. In addition the author delves into the physiology and sociology of why we love cats enough to spend billions of $$$ every year to have them take over our living spaces and place demands on us. If that were not enough the book spends a fair amount of time exploring common myths and misconceptions about the actual usefulness of cats. This book didn't change my opinion of cats, despite this eye-opening fact finding mission... I'll continue to rescue them and live with them. But i do have my eyes opened just a little more, and that's never a bad thing.

This book gives an excellent account of how we got to our present cat-controlled state of society. By happy chance, PBS also ran a Nature episode on the same theme while I was finishing up the last chapter. Great synchronicity!

If you’re looking for the short answer, it would be “both.” If you want a more complete answer, this enjoyable and informative book is a good place to start.

However, after a chapter citing a study demolishing a myth I was always dubious about, that humans domesticated cats to eat rats, Abigail Tucker concludes prematurely that cats domesticated themselves. While there might be something to that, the chapter on rats doesn’t exactly exhaust the reasons why cats would have been domesticated. The growth of agriculture provided the basis for cities, heavily dependent on grain being stored safely, and rats are hardly the only threat to it. There are mice, insects, birds, and all kinds of creatures that feed on grain and that cats love to kill, sometimes regardless of whether they eat them or not. In fact, a lot of the book documents this cat behavior in detail. Cat-worship in ancient Egypt started with lions, but there must be a reason it morphed into house cats.

I am a Marxist, which is part of the humanist tradition, and Marx and Engels in The Communist Manifesto write in a section entitled “conservative, or bourgeois socialism” about “members of societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals.” Their point isn’t that animals shouldn’t be treated well, but that we need to start with the treatment of humans, and only the working class can lead that fight. (See also Humanism and Socialism and the The Marxist Theory of Alienation).

Both feral cats and house cats who are allowed out do pose a threat many species. Much as I love cats, I don’t want to see any species of birds go extinct, and there are people who love birds as much as I love cats. Do we want to decide which species survive by a popularity contest? Every decision humans make can have massive consequences for other species, and for ourselves. (Of course we're responsible for more extinctions than cats are).

I don’t claim to have the answer to the “cat question,” but it’s clear that the huge number of well-intentioned volunteers who spay or neuter feral cats and send them back are accomplishing virtually nothing; the cat populations still grow by the proverbial and cat-like leaps and bounds, and sexless cats still prey on other species. And while volunteers may do this part, there are usually organizations with well-paid staff, huge publicity budgets, and endless campaigns to take our money to solve what is, after all, a social issue involving people, cats, and the entire environment. I’m all for volunteer labor, but it should accomplish something more than providing meritocrats with salaries. And it shouldn’t be pitting cat lovers vs. bird lovers.

While some people breed cats for looks, there’s been little attempt to breed them for further domestication; perhaps to give up predatory behavior.

The fact is that none of the major problems facing us, from large scale malnutrition and deaths from easily curable childhood diseases, to the size of the cat and bird populations can be solved except by centralized planning, and on an international scale. The resources exist to do all this and more, but so long as everything is a commodity, things are rarely done unless someone profits.

And Tucker takes us through the multi-billion-dollar world of cat food and cat accoutrements. And the world of people, themselves “fat cats,” who can afford to and want to create feline-centric dwellings based on someone’s concept of “What is my cat asking for?” This is not possible (or necessary) for the working class and our cats. Do some of these people think that us “deplorables” shouldn’t be allowed to have cats if we can’t spend millions on them?

The recent hurricanes remind me that in Cuba when evacuations are needed, no person is left on their own, and their pets are evacuated along with them Here if you’re poor, both you and your pet are on their own!

Tucker also discusses the dangers of the parasite that causes toxoplasmosis, and the complex and contradictory issues of human/cat relations.

The fate of all life, both domesticated and wild is tied to the fate of humans, and for those interested in taking a Marxist look at it, I also recommend Our Politics Start with the World (New International No. 13), and the article “The stewardship of nature also falls to the working class: In defense of land and labor” in Revolution, Internationalism, and Socialism: The Last Year of Malcolm X (New International no. 14) (New International, Number 14).

Left: V.I. Lenin with cat; Right: the critic faces his dangerous cat Moor, armed with only a Kindle.

This book contained very sloppy reasoning and research. On one hand, cats have been solely responsible for the extinction of countless species of prey animals but, on the other hand, cats are such poor hunters they are terrible mousers and contribute no value to their host families. You can't have it both ways. I disliked the book so much that I recycled it instead of passing it on to others to read.

This is really an interesting book. Much new information (to me) about cats and made me look at my pets with a different mindset. Still love them, however--whatever their faults, Every cat owner should read this!!

Wonderful and complete information. I learned many, many things that, even as a cat owner of many years, I had NO idea about. Well written, funny, easy to read (but not too easy). This woman also writes for The Smithsonian and I have enjoyed her articles in that magazine. A bit longish on Toxoplasmosis, however in general well worth the money and very comprehensive. Now I know what I can't 'domesticate' my cat! I don't give out many 5 stars but this book is one of them - shared it with my book club friends and rave reviews ensued!

Quite boring and depressing. I did not enjoy reading a single chapter and had to force myself to finish reading it. I regret having wasted my time with this poorly written book. Definitely not a book for anyone that likes and appreciates cats.

I can only conclude that this author does not understand cats at all. Leaving out the wildly inaccurate accusations against the whole species, let me just address one issue: she claims that cats give us nothing. I have lived with a series of wonderful little Siamese over my 67 years, one--and once two--at a time. Every one gave much more than she received in the way of love and attempted helpfulness. My current elderly Siamese has brought joy every day. From her tiny three-pound kitten self to her dignified lady now, she has put me first every way she could. She met me at the door every time I came home from anywhere until within the last year. She greeted me with enthusiastic purring and rubbing and jumping about in joy. "You're Home. I Missed You." was unmistakeable. Now she sits up when I come home and greets me from her bed, where I rush to her side. We always leave a window cracked when we work outside so she can call to us if she needs us. One day, she did. She called LOUDLY over and over. We rushed indoors, looking to see if she was injured or if the house was on fire, or what. We had been inside for less than ninety seconds when we glanced out the window and saw a mother moose with calf right where we had just been working! I could add dozens of examples, small and great, but will close with another woman's story of how her adult cat suddenly started clawing gently at the woman's chest and uttering cries of distress. This was so unusual from her very loving kitty that she went straight to a doctor. She was diagnosed with early breast cancer, and she said the cat's actions saved her life. Yes, PREGNANT women should heed medical warnings about cleaning littler boxes--read up on toxoplasmosis--but otherwise this book is wrong in almost all its conclusions.

I just love reading anything about cats, and about the stupidity of people who think that Trap/Neuter/Re-abandoning them is the only humane way to handle the overpopulation problem, and that there is absolutely no health danger from turning them loose to spread rabies, toxoplasmonis, hookworm, toxocariasis, plague and other zoonotics in our neigbhor's yards, our parks and playgrounds and our waterways. What is the world is humane about dying from disease, trauma, predation or human cruelty?

I had seen the documentary before I ordered the book, but I thought the book might contain more anecdotes about cat behavior; so, I was disappointed with the book. I had ordered it for a "cat" lover and I did not give it to her.

I carefully read the first seventy pages of this book, and then when I began to get the uneasy feeling that Abigail Tucker is to cats as Nazis were to Jews, I browsed through the rest of the book and saw that my fears were confirmed. I am terribly disappointed in the book and an sorry I spent my money on it.

I had seen the documentary before I ordered the book, but I thought the book might contain more anecdotes about cat behavior; so, I was disappointed with the book. I had ordered it for a "cat" lover and I did not give it to her.

I carefully read the first seventy pages of this book, and then when I began to get the uneasy feeling that Abigail Tucker is to cats as Nazis were to Jews, I browsed through the rest of the book and saw that my fears were confirmed. I am terribly disappointed in the book and an sorry I spent my money on it.

So far, this book is nothing but negativity and cynicism about the role of cats in our lives, from ancient history to present. Cats never did much to quell the rodent population, according to her, and they have simply manipulated their way into our lives. That might not be so bad in itself, but she devotes a whole chapter to toxoplasmosis and speculates, at length, that this parasite enables cats to hypnotize owners into subservience. She also goes on about how cats lack affection for their human owners and how little help they are in improving emotional or physical health of owners. She is fond of comparing cats to dogs and in almost every instance, the dogs are the better pets. If you can get through the chapters about how stray cats decimate the bird and rodent population (true, but she waxes rhapsodic on the subject) and the cynical skepticism about the efficacy of TNR, then you can handle the rest. If this is her idea of a favorable book on cats, I feel sorry for Cheeto. It's highly critical and I don't feel the love. I'm kind of mad at myself for getting this far.

I honestly am perplexed by this book. Ms. Tucker purports to love cats, and it DOES seem that she does. It's her choice of vocabulary that puzzles me for one thing. There is a lot of verbage like "killer." "murderer," "manipulative," "purposeless," etc. She also goes into lengthy detail about how there is a parasite that spreads from them to us, which supposedly destroys the brain and one third of all humanity have it. I look around me and all I can say is "?" She says that cats are complete loners and usually will hate any other animal in the house and that they serve no purpose, other than to soak up our hard earned money. She makes a general statement about how useful dogs are. Both of these theses are so over generalized as to be ludicrous. I'm not going into the many things that cats do for us and how many canines are more of a menace than people suspect. That would be a book in itself. I am 63 and spent 23 years with a cat who really did have a lot to do with me wanting to continue life. He is gone now, but I have another. Do I transfer human characteristics onto him? No. He is a cat and behaves like a cat, but that is a wide range of behavioral characteristics and Ms. Tucker generalizes to the point of stereotyping. She DOES make good points about how some people become obsessed about our furry friends and carry their affection to the point of silliness, BUT WHO ARE WE AND WHO IS SHE TO JUDGE. As long as one's house is not smeared in filth and a health hazard, so what? She makes many general statements that just don't cut it. The book is worth reading, but get it at the library.

As many of the other reviewers have said, this book shows a real lack of critical thinking. The author really seems to have no scientific background at all and draws conclusions that make no sense. For example, in one chapter she says that even though people think our ancestors took in and fed cats because they kept mice and rats out of our food, she said that couldn't possibly be true because of a single study that shows cats in a city do not eat rats, but live peaceably with them. However in the next chapter she writes about how cats have almost totally wiped out a species of rats. She can't have it both ways... There are many examples like that in the book, and so unfortunately I didn't enjoy it as much as I hoped. I'm glad I didn't waste my money on it. I just borrowed it from the library.

A self-contradictory mess of a book that's around an inch deep, research-wise. If you want to read something scientific or historical in nature about cats, please consider a work by an actual scientist or historian. This writer is most assuredly neither, and she doesn't even answer the basic question behind the book with anything more than random speculation.

For the record, while I have and love cats, I am not objecting to scathing reviews of their impact on natural environments, such as this book contains.
I also don't object to the somewhat sketchy, hoarding-type motivations of some of the TNR folks, as depicted here (albeit a bit too cynically for my taste -- an the author belatedly admits euthanasia doesn't solve the overpopulation problem, either.) I do, however, object to such speculations that cats are behind many, if not most, forms of mental illness (a claim of several people she interviews); that cats offer nothing at best, and usually degrade the quality of life for their associated humans (decidedly not true for most of us); that they were useless at combating rodent infestations even historically because they rarely kill rats. (Being small, cats are mousers, not ratters, generally speaking.)

In short, her thesis appears to be that cats are social parasites who have hijacked our innate parenting instincts, manipulating us into expending resources upon them that we could have better spent on our young. While this may indeed be true, you can probably say the same about all pets whose value isn't directly correlated to food or labor.

Her view that cats cannot and do not regard us with any affection and are innately expressionless is also patently false. In regards to the latter, it's true that cats -- like many animals -- don't express themselves through facial expression like humans do; rather, it's in the position of the ears, the whiskers, the eyes, the tail, etc. The same goes for most animals, including dogs, which the author considers a far worthier and more useful pet.

Cats also *do* express care and appreciation for their owners, as many of us can tell you. Yes, that's anecdotal, but so is the "research" she provides that shows the contrary -- specifically, her penchant for adopting unadoptable ferals, who then behave, well, like ferals. (A hint to the author: When the folks at the shelter say, "No, not that one -- please adopt one of these actual *pet* cats," it pays to listen. Just as a violent, maladjusted dog is not the yardstick for all canines, feral cats who are outside the window of socialization are not the yardstick for all cats.)

Such a promising title.

And such a disappointment.

Tucker says she's a cat lover, and I think she probably is. Yet she conveys an impressively negative tone in this book, as if she feels guilty about liking our favorite little carnivores. She's very insistent that cats serve no real, practical use in human settlements, citing for instance studies that seem to show that cats are not very effective ratters. Nowhere does she mention that in fact cats are primarily thought of as mousers. For serious rat killing, yes, you mostly want the smaller terrier type dogs.

Yet mice are a significant threat to grain stores, and volunteer mouse control would have been welcome in early farming communities.

She much later in the book mentions that rats are apparently strongly repelled by cat urine, and avoid areas where it is present. At no point does she comment on how unlikely this is if cats have never been a threat to rats, or how useful this might be to farmers regardless of whether or not cats actually kill rats.

She also credulously recites tales of cats devastating nearly every other small animal except mice, including claims that they kill "billions" of birds annually in the US, without ever citing the sources for the reader to follow up on. It's a figure that initially came from the initial hypothesis that was the beginning of a study, not from the conclusions of the study. The conclusions are not nearly so popular with cat haters.

She mentions, in passing, but does not highlight, junk science from a Smithsonian researcher later convicted of animal cruelty after trying to wipe out an entire managed cat colony via poisoning.

Tucker's discussion of the essentially solitary nature (she says) of the cat doesn't mention the studies that show feral and semi-feral rural cats voluntarily form colonies, including females sharing kitten care and even nursing of young kittens, in areas where they could easily form exclusive territories if they wished. Shared kitten raising is a behavior limited to two members of the cat family: lions and house cats. As such, it's a pretty interesting behavior, and one you'd think would be worth mentioning.

In discussing control of feral cats, she trots out all arguments supporting the claim that Trap-Neuter-Release is of limited effectiveness. PETA is cited as an animal welfare organization to quote its anti-TNR position. PETA in fact favors killing all cats found outside a home, whether ferals, free-roaming pets, or indoor pets who have accidentally gotten out. Their goal is no domestic animals at all.

Eventually, after many paragraphs of similar nonsense, she gets around to mentioning, in passing, that trap & kill, as a method of controlling feral cat populations, is even less effective.

It really is an interesting book, but should be read, or listened to, with a healthy dose of skepticism.

I bought this audiobook.