BUDE based author Richard Peirce’s latest book has topped the wildlife book chart in South Africa, and made the best seller shelves.

Cuddle Me, Kill Me follows his other books on rhino poaching, elephants, and Nicole the great white shark.

Lions are known as the king of beasts, and in South Africa are now being intensively farmed like chickens, pigs, and other domestic livestock.

Richard’s book is a searing expose of the brutal exploitation of an iconic wild species. The profit chain starts when cubs are taken away from their mothers at only a few hours old to provide opportunities for naïve foreign volunteers to pay to ‘save’ the orphaned cubs, and so make a conservation contribution to saving lions, which are an endangered species.

Various other money making uses are found for these big cats before they are shot having only just reached adulthood.

They are killed young either by canned ‘hunters‘, or by their breeders who sell their skeletons into the bone trade.

Richard is at the forefront of the global campaign to convince the South African government to stop the breeding of lions in captivity. It is a brutal subject but the book is written with great sensitivity and will empower rather than upset readers.

Cuddle Me, Kill Me is released in the UK on August 1 and is widely available online from Amazon, WHSmith, Waterstones, Richard’s website, and others and selected high street shops.