From the Publisher
"Schlanger’s extensive reporting on the latest scientific thinking, paired with her own salient observations, allows for a fresh understanding of plants and their role in the world." — Washington Post
“A stunning book…. will transform how you see not only plants but the nature of all life.” — Scientific American
“Schlanger's captivating exploration renders a rich world of plants: weird fern sex, sagebrush chemical communication, scientific debates on flora intelligence, and more.” — Vanity Fair
"The vegetable kingdom is full of wonders and mysteries, as Schlanger lavishly demonstrates in The Light Eaters . . . These are the unsung miracles that surround us daily . . . The Light Eaters ushers those marvels onto center stage." — Slate
"Schlanger’s well-crafted descriptions provide a rare and welcome glimpse into the humanity and dedication of botanists . . . The Light Eaters overflows with the author’s infectious enthusiasm. Plant lovers will find much of interest in Schlanger’s inspiring tale of where her curious mind has led her." — Nature
“The Light Eaters is a masterpiece of science writing. Burning with open-minded curiosity, this exploration of the emerging revolution in plant science will challenge what you think you know and ignite a new way of seeing the plant world. Part detective story, part field trip and part philosophy, this brilliant book stretches the mind, toward a profound new understanding of the sophistication of under-appreciated plants. I feel it as an antidote to arrogance, as it engenders humility, respect and awe for the light eaters who make the world.” — Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
“The Light Eaters is riveting and revolutionary and I’m devouring it in small bites to digest how it’s reorganizing my universe.” — Rebecca Solnit
"I’ll never look at plants—or the natural world—in the same way again, after reading Zoë Schlanger’s stunning book. Instead of trying to ram the square peg of botanical life into the round holes of human biology and metaphors, Schlanger instead considers plants on their own terms, as they actually are. The result is mesmerizing, world-expanding, and achingly beautiful." — Ed Yong, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of An Immense World and I Contain Multitudes
“A brilliant must-read about the marvels of the green world. This book shook and changed me, revealing plant intelligence as more strange and wondrous than I could imagine. Zoë Schlanger’s explorations brim with curiosity and every page brings new revelation and insight.” — David George Haskell, author of Sounds Wild and Broken, The Songs of Trees, and The Forest Unseen
“Like its subject, The Light Eaters is rich, vital, and full of surprises. Read it! You will look at the world in a new way.” — Elizabeth Kolbert, author of Under a White Sky and The Sixth Extinction
“…an astounding exploration of the remarkable abilities of plants and fungi.…There are mind-bending revelations on every page, and Schlanger combines robust intellectual curiosity with delicate lyricism….Science writing doesn’t get better than this.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“This is that rare book that fascinates, challenges widely held assumptions, and enlightens in like measure…. it is hard to imagine a more thorough introduction or a writer more dedicated to her subject and provocative in the questions she asks.” — Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“Just as books by Peter Wohlleben and Suzanne Simard have deepened our understanding of trees, the discoveries Schlanger shares in this involving, vibrant, and affecting dispatch from the vanguard of plant research profoundly expands our appreciation for plants, their essential role in the great web of life, and how recognition of plant intelligence can help us reverse environmental decimation.” — Booklist (starred review)
“Captivating.” — The Guardian
"[A] fascinating journey through contemporary botanical research." — Orion
"The Light Eaters is a love letter to the world of plants. In this well-researched look into the way plants have learned to survive, we meet plants with flowers that change the shape of their blooms to better accommodate pollinators and vines that learn to blend in with the bushes they grow around. With her examination of these incredible specimens of the natural world, Zoë Schlanger illustrates what humanity can learn from the never-ending wisdom of plants." — Book Riot
“Schlanger [speaks] about the sometimes spicy and always rigorous world of plant science, undoing the myth of separation, learning to hold the complexity of plants, and what we stand to gain by welcoming them as intelligent kin, rather than simply decoration.” — Atmos
“It's rare that you read a book that makes you want to grab people to tell them what it's about, but this is one of them.” — Daily Mail (UK)
Kirkus Reviews
★ 2024-01-30
Ambitious attempts to decode the manifest mysteries of plants.
Schlanger, a staff reporter at the Atlantic, has followed multiple veins of study on plant life to reveal remarkable discoveries and some potentially revolutionary conjectures. Her passion for the realm of plants—and what their lives tell us about our own—is consistent throughout this wondrous text. This is that rare book that fascinates, challenges widely held assumptions, and enlightens in like measure. The author doubtless considers the narrative an overview of current plant science (and its history) for general readers, notwithstanding the years invested in her own preparatory research, but it is hard to imagine a more thorough introduction or a writer more dedicated to her subject and provocative in the questions she asks. Schlanger chronicles her edifying interactions with dozens of scientists, describing numerous experiments. She also weighs the skepticism of botanists and biologists who think the study of intelligence in plants is folly. Many scientists, she notes, still recoil from the damage done to legitimate research by the largely spurious but immensely popular 1973 bookThe Secret Life of Plants, “a mix of real science, flimsy experiments, and unscientific projection.” However, this reticence pales when held against new studies of the ways in which plants communicate, defend themselves, and remember, as well as the considerations of how biological systems can replicate across the spectrum of species. What is indisputable is that plants made animal life possible in the most fundamental way, transitioning the world’s atmosphere from a toxic shroud of carbon dioxide to an oasis of oxygen. In this lovely book, the plant universe finds a human champion appreciative of its earthly role, concerned for its welfare, and amazed at its capacities.
A delightful work of popular science. You may never look at your houseplants or garden in quite the same way again.
