The Natural History Of Unicorns

A mind-opening work of intricate scholarship. If unicorns do exist I hope they never catch one. A great read that will grace my library -- David Bellamy Lively, compelling, full of anecdote, wry scepticism and an honest humility about the things it is simply impossible for us to know for certain -- Daniel Hahn * Guardian * Intriguing ... The history of a non-existent animal is, by definition, a series of diversions from actuality, and, by reversing that trajectory, Lavers' book takes us to some fascinating places * Financial Times * Scholarly and continually absorbing ... highly original and stylish ... Everything you need to know about unicorns is here. Lovely * Spectator * This cultural history takes us through India and Africa and has many colourful tales. Chris Lavers uses the mythical unicorn to reveal man's strange entanglement with the natural world -- Patrick Neale * Bookseller * A fascinating, intelligent and unusual book. From the first page I was completely hooked -- Pat Shipman This absorbing hunt ... reflects our own journey from superstition to reason -- Jakub Figurski * Intelligent Life * The book, like its subject, is not quite one thing nor another, but a fascinating hybrid. For a start, this "natural history" is just that - a study that is attentive to the natural sciences, a scientific quest into the origins of a species with real, living relatives ... But it is a book equally concerned with the history of religious beliefs, of art, of exploration and trade -- Daniel Hahn * Guardian * Lavers examines why the mythical unicorn has interested humans throughout history and where the myths and legends came from * The Times * Chris Lavers traces our fascination with the idea of a one-horned horse back 2000 years in this scholarly history of unicorns ... The history of the unicorn shows human beings at our imaginative best and our manipulative worst -- Helen Brown * Daily Telegraph * Some writers might shy away from conducting an anthropological study of a creature that, for most of us, resides only in spiritual bookshops and She-Ra cartoons. Not Lavers, who goes to painstaking lengths to analyse and deconstruct reports of the animals through the ages, to find out how - and even if - they were first imagined * Esquire * Laver's book traces the origins and development of the myth and wonders what the one-horned beast tells us about ourselves * New Humanist * Entertaining and diverting ... The unicorn remains a symbol of power and mystery, and Laver's lively account is as full of marvels -- Philip Hoare * Sunday Telegraph * In this beguiling book, Chris Lavers pursues the unicorn across two and a half millenniums ... By the end of this wise and entertaining book, his unicorn has ceased to be the quaint motif of nursery rhyme and heraldry, and has instead become a symbol of vulnerability and co-dependence of species, including our own -- Rosemary Hill * Sunday Times * The origin of the species and its later fame in lore and legend is cleverly told -- Iain Finlayson * The Times * Into this realm of heraldic beast and supercharged My Little Pony steps the refreshingly un-wafty figure of Chris Lavers ... If this is a journey of detours, it is a very engaging one and we fall in with some fascinating companions, both human and animal, along the way -- Jane Shilling * Evening Standard * An absorbing read and a worthy addition to the literature of this remarkable creature -- Karl Shuker * Fortean Times * A delightful history of the myths and misunderstandings that have surrounded the unicorn * London Review of Books *