The Talking Book by Jane De Suza – Fun and Informative Journey of Communication

The Talking Book is a fun, informative, and thought-provoking journey of communication that sparks curiosity and invites readers to communicate about communication.

Synopsis

Are you ready to solve one of the world’s biggest how we talk?

The story of communication begins in prehistoric times, gallops through the dark arts, untranslatable words and languages brought back from the dead, and arrives in the age of AI. Along the way, we meet outstanding characters—the one-word man, the 400-word monkey and the million-word computer—who play their part in the development of language.

Every tale in this book holds a clue to the gigantic puzzle of the evolution of language that has hypnotized brilliant minds over time. Handprints of not-quite-humans on ancient cave walls, secrets buried in ash from a seven-year-long winter, forbidden experiments by kings on babies and even a rogue gene hiding in your DNA—how do they all piece together?

Enjoy the rollercoaster ride of language, hilarious histories and crazy quizzes, but ignore the wise-cracking dog who will insist he wrote this book.

Review

The Talking Book is engaging and informative nonfiction about journey of communication, spanning from cavemen to today’s AI.

That cover is fun and the writing makes the whole journey of communication just as much fun. The way book started with why communication is important or why caveman might have began communicating, it’s clear how prolific the author is and how engaging the whole nonfiction book is going to be even for children.

The author covers an impressive array of topics related to communication: why and when it began, how it evolved from the first humans to the first recorded messages, and everything from linguistic theories to scientific facts about how communication is wired into us genetically.

The book explores protolanguages to sister language, language that are extinct, language that has reborn, and language that are struggling to survive. It even touches on the history of language experiments and the diverse modes of communication, from dictionaries and constructed languages to sign language, ciphers, and codes.

There were many information author provided in just few pages that I’m sure is just a small part of this big ever evolving complex topic that author made easy, engaging and entertaining.

Each chapter poses thought-provoking questions such as:

• Which came first: language or the speaker?
• Why can’t chimps, who share 98% of our DNA, communicate like humans?
• Can animals talk, or do they just make sounds?
• Why can parrots mimic certain words? (yes, it’s like chicken and egg question)

These questions ignite curiosity, keeping the reader engaged while maintaining a smooth and appealing narrative. What I especially loved is that the author doesn’t claim to have all the answers—some aspects of communication remain mysteries, and that acknowledgment only adds to the intrigue.

The book is packed with humor and fun facts. Each chapter features fact boxes with quizzes, historical tidbits, and etymological insights, sprinkled with the author’s dog’s witty commentary. The book doesn’t just talk about communication—it makes the reader think, communicate, and reflect on its importance.

I can’t help but think where we would have been without communication (maybe those chimps who share our 98% DNA!) It also made me appreciate our native language looking at how fast the languages are evolving and how many languages are getting lost.

One of my favorite fact was learning about the phrase “bird brain.” We often use that phrase but I never knew it’s not bird but mosquito whose brain has less neurons. So, next time, maybe say “mosquito brain” instead of “bird brain” (though be warned, as the author suggests in below quote, even the smallest brains can outwit us).

“The human brain is packed with 86,000,000,000 neurons. Just to put that into respective, the pigeon’s is estimated at 300,000,000. Bird brain, really? The mosquito’s brain is estimated to have only 220,000 neurons, and it still manages to outfox me.”

Overall, The Talking Book is a fun, informative, and thought-provoking journey of communication that sparks curiosity and invites readers to communicate about communication.

Book Links

Goodreads | Amazon.in | Amazon.com | Amazon.co.uk

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