Vanessa Woods

Researcher and Author

Vanessa Woods is the Director of the Duke Puppy Kindergarten and an award winning writer and journalist. In 2010, her book Bonobo Handshake: A memoir of Love and Adventure in Congo won the Thomas Lowell award for non fiction and her children’s book, It’s true, Space turns you into Spaghetti was named an Acclaimed Book by the Royal Society in 2007. Her books have been translated into 12 languages. Woods received the Australiasian Science award for journalism in 2004.

In 2022, Vanessa was voted a Duke icon by the Duke community and selected by a special committee at The Chronicle, an award which recognizes "kindness, passion, talent or intellect”.

Hare and Woods live together with their dog Congo in North Carolina. Their first book together, The Genius of Dogs was a New York Times Bestseller.