Book Review + Giveaway: Holy Cow by David Duchovny

★★★★✩

I would like to start with a massive thank you to Headline Publishing who sent me this book via Bookbridgr in exchange for an honest review. I gave this book a nice, meaty 4 stars!

Holy Cow follows the story of Elsie Bovary, who starts the tale as an ordinary, happy cow who spends her days being milked, eating grass, and chatting with her BFF. However, everything changes for Elsie one night when she sneaks from her pasture and finds herself drawn to the farmhouse. Through the window, she sees the family gathered around what can only be a Box God, and this Box God reveals the truth about what really happens to cows, including Elsie's mother, when they disappear from the farm.


Motivated by fear and anger, Elsie plans to flee the farm to a better and safer world. After discovering what Elsie intends to do, two other farm residents decide to join her in a bid to obtain a better life, and so a motley crew is formed: Elsie; the once happy cow who desires a life in India where cows are worshipped; Shalom, a grumpy pig who has recently converted to Judaism; and Tom, a suave turkey who cannot fly, but can use his beak to work an iPhone. First they just need to steal some passports and disguise themselves in human attire before heading to the airport. What could possibly go wrong...?


         When starting this book you really need to leave your sense of reality with the cover and take your imagination through this bonkers tale so you simply enjoy it. It was a wonderful read and I was honestly hooked from the start thanks to our narrator, Elsie. Her character is fabulous! Her charming and comical voice kept me entertained throughout the full book, and I found myself chuckling away as I read.

"Pooping while you're getting milked is one of life's great pleasures. You should try it sometime."

I especially loved the screenplay form of writing for conversations between Elsie and her BFF, Mallory. David Duchovny did a splendid job of portraying her as stereotypical, yet hilariously loveable, teenager, using phrases such as 'bae', 'cray cray' and 'OMG'. In fact, any interactions in the book were humorous thanks to Elsie's comical character. I know it's oh-so-cliché to say, but her personality really did leap off the page. This story would have been nowhere near as good if not told from the wonderfully bonkers point of view of Elsie the cow. Her cute illustrations were a lovely added touch to the book as well.



Beneath all of the giggles and fun, David Duchovny leaves an underlying notion that animals are more than mindless creatures there to serve and feed the human race, yet he doesn't preach. He keeps it light-hearted, self aware, yet subtly gets the message across to really make you think. I won't be giving up up sausages and beef any time soon though... sorry! ;)

Keeping you engaged with plenty of adorably hilarious characters on a surreal mission with a tonne of laughable twists and turns along the way, Holy Cow tells a heart warming tale of three charismatic animals seeking a better life, who may just discover that the grass isn't always greener on the other side.

"So I guess it's not so important that dreams come true, it's just important that you have a dream to begin with, to get you to take your first steps."

Fancy having the opportunity to read David Duchovny's Holy Cow? Headline Publishing have kindly worked with me to offer one lucky winner a hard copy of this novel. So, how do you enter? It's simple! Simply log in to Twitter and retweet the tweet linked below! 

Click here to find the competition tweet!!

The competition will close at 9pm on Wednesday 25th February, so you have a whopping 10 days to get your entries in, starting today! UK only. A winner will be picked at random and announced on Twitter shortly after closing time. If the winner doesn't get back to me within 48 hours, another winner will be picked from the pot. Good luck everyone. :)