Slugs: A Manifesto

by Abi Palmer

Genres: Nonfiction, Poetry

Paperback

Published June 5, 2025

Reviews

[Louisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Phenomena, phenomenal. Incredibly horny slimy sticky slug book. Absolutely obsessed with the disgust and the obscenity and the transformation into a bodily experience of crip and queer critiques of society. I now really want to slug out and and who knew that would ever be something I thought.

🥟 🥟 🥟

The surprise Catholic undertones were fascinating. Are the slugs all Hes? They're all loaded up sexually either way. Thoroughly re-imagined my relationship with The Slug.

[Jennifer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this a lot... would have been less, I think, had I not been to the exhibition, it might otherwise have felt more disjointed and unfocused. And the book does enhance my appreciation of the exhibition. There's more autobiographical material here, including the hassles of displaying her glorious twirling slugs in another venue. Abi Palmer takes multimedia creativity to the fullest extent.

[kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

disgust and desire 🤩🤩🤩

[Allison Maddox · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was gross and captivating and brilliant and slimy and I loved all of it. Too many creatures get a bad reputation because they're inconvenient to us, or because we've been conditioned to hate them, or just because humans don't understand how and why the natural world functions or how important it all is. I really enjoyed reading about Abi's experiences, her narrative is so gripping. Her thoughts on slugs and institutions and social constructs left slimy goop in my brain that is currently reconstructing some of my thought highways. It's mind-blowing how entrenched and brainwashed we are by society's expectations, and I wish we would all ask a lot more questions, conform a lot less, and give other people support to do the same instead of shaming anyone who doesn't drink the koolaid.

[Giorgia · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’d never thought about how we treat slugs as morally bad and repulsive! And how that’s how we USED to treat fungi, until recently when we realised their benefits to our health, the ecosystem, climate change, etc. etc. and now we have artwork of them in our homes?? Interesting comparison. And I loved the “slugs are fine but i hate how they eat my lettuce” and she’s like “whose lettuce?” like yeahhhh 🫰🫰🫰🫰and the slug sex story was juicy

[Róisín Walsh · Rating 4 out of 5]

delightful