The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth by Zoë Schlanger

The New Yorker's Best Books of 2024 - TIME's 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2024 - New York Magazine's 10 Best Books of the Year - Washington Post's 50 Notable Works of Nonfiction of 2024 - Smithsonian's 10 Best Science Books of the Year - A Best Book of the Year: Boston Globe, Scientific American, New York Public Library, Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly - An Amazon Best Nonfiction Book of the Year

Longlisted for the National Book Critics Circle Nonfiction Prize - Finalist for the Chautauqua Prize - Finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize - Winner of the National Outdoor Book Award for Natural History

It takes tremendous biological creativity to be a plant. To survive and thrive while rooted in a single spot, plants have adapted ingenious methods of survival. In recent years, scientists have learned about their ability to communicate, recognize their kin and behave socially, hear sounds, morph their bodies to blend into their surroundings, store useful memories that inform their life cycle, and trick animals into behaving to their benefit, to name just a few remarkable talents.

The Light Eaters is a deep immersion into the drama of green life and the complexity of this wild and awe-inspiring world that challenges our very understanding of agency, consciousness, and intelligence. In looking closely, we see that plants, rather than imitate human intelligence, have perhaps formed a parallel system. What is intelligent life if not a vine that grows leaves to blend into the shrub on which it climbs, a flower that shapes its bloom to fit exactly the beak of its pollinator, a pea seedling that can hear water flowing and make its way toward it? Zoë Schlanger takes us across the globe, digging into her own memories and into the soil with the scientists who have spent their waking days studying these amazing entities up close.

What can we learn about life on Earth from the living things that thrive, adapt, consume, and accommodate simultaneously? More important, what do we owe these life forms once we come to understand their rich and varied abilities? Examining the latest epiphanies in botanical research, Schlanger spotlights the intellectual struggles among the researchers conceiving a wholly new view of their subject, offering a glimpse of a field in turmoil as plant scientists debate the tenets of ongoing discoveries and how they influence our understanding of what a plant is.

We need plants to survive. But what do they need us for--if at all? An eye-opening and informative look at the ecosystem we live in, this book challenges us to rethink the role of plants--and our own place--in the natural world.

Zoë Schlanger is a staff writer at the Atlantic, where she covers climate change. She previously covered the environment at Quartz and Newsweek. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, the New York Review of Books, Time, NPR, and elsewhere. Schlanger was the recipient of a 2017 National Association of Science Writers reporting award. She lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Review Quotes:

"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

"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

"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

"A stunning book . . . will transform how you see not only plants but the nature of all life." - Scientific American

"[A] fascinating journey through contemporary botanical research." - Orion

"... [Zoë] looks beyond the leaves and branches to how our verdant neighbors perceive our world, offering a plant's eye view of life. . . . [ The Light Eaters] shines." - Smithsonian magazine, "The Ten Best Science Books of 2024"

"...Schlanger reminds us of a common truth that we tend to take for granted: plants are remarkable. Behind each stage of development in their lives is a complex system, one that she describes in awe-inspiring detail. Combining research with her own personal stories, the author illuminates why plants are so vital to our ecosystem and asks pressing questions about the relationship between humans and natural life. The result is a surprising and tender book of science writing that urges us all to reconsider how we think about the greenery that lives both in our homes and outside of them." - TIME, The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2024

"The human mind will boggle at least once per page." - Boston Globe, 75 Best Books of 2024

". . . fascinating . . .Schlanger, who initially turned to the topic as a distraction from her relentlessly dispiriting work as a climate journalist (before quitting to obsess about plants full-time), introduces the reader to an engaging cast of boundary-pushing botanists and follows her curiosity to laboratories, jungles, and even a cave. Filled with eye-popping examples of vegetal feats and buoyed by Schlanger's earnest infatuation, The Light Eaters may not arrive at an indisputable conclusion--the debate continues, after all--but you will likely never look at your houseplants the same way." - Audubon Magazine, These 7 Books About Plants Deserve a Spot on Your Birding Bookshelf

"My entire relationship to plants has been altered, rather shockingly, by having read The Light Eaters . . . . Just sitting in a backyard, surrounded by plants, became a visitation with other beings - a truly life-expanding book." - Torrey Peters, author of Stag Dance and Detransition, Baby

"[Schlanger's] reporting, far from blurring the boundary between persons and plants, instead dramatizes the plant kingdom as a strange, alien world, right here and ready to teach us that there are more things in Heaven and Earth than we have yet dreamt." - Front Porch Republic

"I'm currently reading The Light Eaters by Zoë Schlanger, a smart and engaging book about the biology and wonder of plants. I love how the more we learn about nature, the more we realize how wise the natural world is. I find this book a welcome journey into the inner workings and science behind the plant world. It's amazing to me how much we still have to learn about how plants live, thrive, and suffer on this planet." - Ada Limón, Shelf Awareness, "Reading with... Ada Limón"

"[A] revelatory debut . . . The Light Eaters is an enchanting read that will compel you to consider the well-being of your humble houseplant." - TIME, The 100 Must-Read Books of 2024

"Communicating the latest advances in biology is often left to the scientists, but Zoë Schlanger proves that a good storyteller can make all those peer-reviewed papers and monotonous lab studies come alive for an interested reader . . . Beautifully written and unexpectedly provocative, Schlanger's book deserves all its accolades." - PASTE, Five Great Nature Books to Get Your Mind Off Other Things

"It takes tremendous biological creativity to be a plant. Zoë Schlanger takes us across the globe, digging into her own memories and into the soil with the scientists who have spent their waking days studying these amazing entities up close." - New York Public Library, "Best Books for Adults 2024"

"This marvel of a book takes readers into the magical world of plants, as environmental and science reporter Schlanger sublimely shows that they are intelligent beings too. She expertly explains that plants can communicate, hear, and adapt. They're not trying to mimic humans either; they have their own complex structures and systems." - Library Journal, Best Nonfiction of 2024

"In her engrossing new book The Light Eaters, Zoë Schlanger . . . offers uncanny examples of plant intelligence while exploring the possible ramifications of this for humans (and plants themselves)." - The Globe and Mail (CA)

"A fascinating look at the hidden world of plant intelligence." - Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Garden & Gun, The Great Southern Summer Reading List

"A rigorous thinker and gifted, expansive storyteller, Schlanger gives us the context to understand what we're learning, interspersing details of plant physiology with sweeping overviews of how life evolved on Earth, the history of the scientific method, and the place of plants in Indigenous cultures. This stunning book upends our take-them-for-granted view of plants and encourages us to really see them--to our profound benefit." - Civil Eats, Our Summer 2024 Food and Farming Book Guide