Review
“Aarathi Prasad has travelled far into the mysterious land of human and animal conception and come back with extraordinary stories of chimaeras and parthenogens, of cannibal sharks in the womb, of pseudosperm and the prospect of birth without pregnancy. A fascinating book.”
Matt Ridley, bestselling author of The Red Queen
“It’s game over for the testicle; the reign of bollocks is at an end. Prasad charts the high road to total male redundancy. In the future, girls will do it for themselves, boys – those who are left – will just be toys. Cheer or weep, but read this book.”
Armand Marie Leroi, author of Mutants
“Think of her as the female equivalent of Brian Cox making science accessible for the masses ... Entertaining and provocative, this promises to change the way you think about sex.”
Stylist
Matt Ridley, bestselling author of The Red Queen
“It’s game over for the testicle; the reign of bollocks is at an end. Prasad charts the high road to total male redundancy. In the future, girls will do it for themselves, boys – those who are left – will just be toys. Cheer or weep, but read this book.”
Armand Marie Leroi, author of Mutants
“Think of her as the female equivalent of Brian Cox making science accessible for the masses ... Entertaining and provocative, this promises to change the way you think about sex.”
Stylist
Product Description
Most cultures tell the tale of a maiden who gives birth untouched by a man, and in the wild there are plenty of creatures – turkeys, Komodo ‘dragons’, and the ‘Jesus Christ’ lizard (which even walks on water) – that take various approaches to making babies without having sex. Soon, humans will have that option, too.In Like a Virgin, biologist and science writer Aarathi Prasad examines inconceivable ideas about conception, from a Renaissance recipe for creating a child (bury semen in manure for forty days) to the search for a real-life virgin mother in the 1950s. She then takes us to maverick, cutting-edge labs that are today inventing sex-less reproduction, from manufactured eggs to artificial wombs and beyond. Like a Virgin delivers an astonishing exploration of the mysteries of sex and evolution – past, present, and future.
