What do you think?
Rate this book
The Period Brain: The new science of the luteal phase – and how to thrive through it
Do you ever wish you could skip the week leading up to your period? So many of us feel like we’re riding a premenstrual roller coaster every month and, as women, we’ve learned to accept it – until now.
In this transformative book, award-winning researcher Dr Sarah Hill explains why during the luteal phase – the second half of our cycle – we feel emotional, bloated, tired, anxious and even depressed, and, most importantly, what we can do to avoid experiencing the same crash every month.
Drawing on the very latest research, you’ll find out how
· Sidestep PMS ‘cravings’ by eating more – you burn up to 11% extra calories in the luteal phase!
· Exercise in a way that’s invigorating instead of draining
· Understand your sex drive and why it changes across the month
· Navigate motivational and energy dips without added stress
· Use anti-inflammatory foods to ease PMS
Providing you with a science-backed roadmap to understanding PMS and the more severe form, PMDD, this book will empower you to finally take control and feel at your best whether you have your period or not.
In this transformative book, award-winning researcher Dr Sarah Hill explains why during the luteal phase – the second half of our cycle – we feel emotional, bloated, tired, anxious and even depressed, and, most importantly, what we can do to avoid experiencing the same crash every month.
Drawing on the very latest research, you’ll find out how
· Sidestep PMS ‘cravings’ by eating more – you burn up to 11% extra calories in the luteal phase!
· Exercise in a way that’s invigorating instead of draining
· Understand your sex drive and why it changes across the month
· Navigate motivational and energy dips without added stress
· Use anti-inflammatory foods to ease PMS
Providing you with a science-backed roadmap to understanding PMS and the more severe form, PMDD, this book will empower you to finally take control and feel at your best whether you have your period or not.
283 pages, Kindle Edition
Published September 25, 2025
5 people are currently reading
62 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
December 31, 2025
This was a genuinely extremely helpful book, that has literally changed the way I view my body. I feel more comfortable and confident in it, now that I understand that my cycling is normal and driven by estrogen and progesterone. I also feel validated in the cycling (but a little stupid I didn’t realise sooner!). Also, the science is fascinating and easy to digest (as I’m not a scientist in this field). I’ve recommended this book to everyone around me.
June 14, 2025
v helpful to know why I’m a hot mess for approx 2 weeks every month and how I can start to balance it all out 😌😌😌😌
November 21, 2025
Atrocious science and atrocious writing. I only managed to read a few chapters and skim a few more, as the innumerable scientific errors and poor communication style were too much to bear.
For starters: multiple graphs and illustrations are comically childish. They lack correct labels on the axis, error bars, p-values or any indication if the results are statistically significant. I imagine this is because the author wants this book to have a more "approachable" style, but the title is called "the New Science of Why We PMS" and the author leans a great deal on her scientific credentials. So it is also quite disappointing when you see her repeatedly leap to conclusions that should instead be the basis for research. One example is at the start of Chapter 7 where she plainly states on one topic: "This [has] only been studied in heterosexual men, but I am guessing that lesbian women find their partners sexier at high fertility too." Guessing?!? That is precisely the kind of question that would make for an interesting hypothesis, but certainly any researcher worth their salt would not presume to know what the answer would be. There are many other examples like this throughout the book, too many to list here.
Similarly in Chapter 7 she cites a statistic that 50-70% of women do not consistently achieve orgasm through intercourse alone as evidence that, in her words, "not all women's bodies are equipped to [orgasm]." This is an appallingly shallow conclusion, in part because there is a considerable body of research on this topic that shows many different factors influence whether a women can orgasm and how frequently (such as partner type, sexual education, cultural upbringing, prior experience, the list goes on and on). I am baffled why the author would draw the conclusion that this statistic indicates women just aren't meant to orgasm or why she would not reference other research in this field.
Speaking of references, you'll note that there are essentially no references cited throughout the book, only a compendium of papers listed at the end. So if you'd like to find which paper some statistic comes from, you have to just do your best to suss out which citation is most likely. This isn't the gravest error, but certainly does not lend credibility to the author.
Overall, this book reads as the manuscript of a researcher who lets her per-conceived notions guide what conclusions she draws from data, rather than the other way around. It doesn't appear the book went through any significant fact checking or review (there are multiple grammatical errors that presumably an editor would've caught). It seems much more in the vein of the numerous pop-science articles that are churned out just for a publication to have some content to show, rather than substance or validity.
While her purported mission - to help women understand their bodies- is admirable, this kind of "science" writing only helps to murky the waters. I'm not sure how this author runs a research lab of their own.
For starters: multiple graphs and illustrations are comically childish. They lack correct labels on the axis, error bars, p-values or any indication if the results are statistically significant. I imagine this is because the author wants this book to have a more "approachable" style, but the title is called "the New Science of Why We PMS" and the author leans a great deal on her scientific credentials. So it is also quite disappointing when you see her repeatedly leap to conclusions that should instead be the basis for research. One example is at the start of Chapter 7 where she plainly states on one topic: "This [has] only been studied in heterosexual men, but I am guessing that lesbian women find their partners sexier at high fertility too." Guessing?!? That is precisely the kind of question that would make for an interesting hypothesis, but certainly any researcher worth their salt would not presume to know what the answer would be. There are many other examples like this throughout the book, too many to list here.
Similarly in Chapter 7 she cites a statistic that 50-70% of women do not consistently achieve orgasm through intercourse alone as evidence that, in her words, "not all women's bodies are equipped to [orgasm]." This is an appallingly shallow conclusion, in part because there is a considerable body of research on this topic that shows many different factors influence whether a women can orgasm and how frequently (such as partner type, sexual education, cultural upbringing, prior experience, the list goes on and on). I am baffled why the author would draw the conclusion that this statistic indicates women just aren't meant to orgasm or why she would not reference other research in this field.
Speaking of references, you'll note that there are essentially no references cited throughout the book, only a compendium of papers listed at the end. So if you'd like to find which paper some statistic comes from, you have to just do your best to suss out which citation is most likely. This isn't the gravest error, but certainly does not lend credibility to the author.
Overall, this book reads as the manuscript of a researcher who lets her per-conceived notions guide what conclusions she draws from data, rather than the other way around. It doesn't appear the book went through any significant fact checking or review (there are multiple grammatical errors that presumably an editor would've caught). It seems much more in the vein of the numerous pop-science articles that are churned out just for a publication to have some content to show, rather than substance or validity.
While her purported mission - to help women understand their bodies- is admirable, this kind of "science" writing only helps to murky the waters. I'm not sure how this author runs a research lab of their own.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews