It took me a while to get into this book. It is an unusual combination of very detailed technical information and autobiography. I got rather lost in some of the technical details but I'm glad I stuck with it as the overall message of the book is so important.

Suzanne Simard was born into a family of loggers and she herself went into the forestry business. She began to notice that in clear-felled sites, where seedlings were replanted, many of them died or struggled to survive. Thus began her quest to determine what made for a healthy forest.

This is a tale of real struggle and perseverance. Again and again the powers that be pushed aside Simard's findings, but her deep belief that a healthy forest required a mix of species drove her forward from one research project to the next. Her findings should change not only the way we manage forests but complete ecosystems. An example of her discoveries, put in very simple terms, being that where fir tree are planted next to birch trees the fir seedlings support the birch trees in the spring when the birch have no leaves. In the height of summer, the birch trees overshadow the fir but they now give sugar to the firs. Then, in the autumn, as the birch leaves fall, the firs once again support the birch.

Simard's discoveries are sometimes amazing: that an injured tree can communicate this to the others around it within hours so they can prepare for potential attack. Other research has shown that links within an ecosystem, such as the impact of salmon on the nourishment of trees. As Simard says, an attack on one species is an attack on all species.

Finding the correct balance in this book between science and autobiography was clearly a challenge. I found the technical details of experiments were just too lengthy however I suspect a scientist might find the shift to family tragedies and health issues a distraction. Somehow I didn't find it an easy book to read, but it was well worth it. I will certainly look at the plants in my own garden in a different light.

My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a review copy.

Finding the Mother Tree was not at all what I expected, but is a brilliant and important book. It is especially suited to anyone interested in nature, looking after the planet or with a deep love of trees. As well as scientific information it is full of personal details and a rich memoir of a life lived dedicated to the Forests of British Columbia. Dr Simard writes very well and is talented in making an important and informative book very interesting and balanced with the story of her life in the forests You will learn a lot about the relationship between trees and will find yourself deep in the authors world full of beauty and challenges.

This was not what I expected it to be! And in a good way! I love a book about trees and this is definitely about trees, but also about a woman and her family who have grown up around trees. And that connection with trees carries through into her adult life and gives her that inquisitive mind to want to go beyond just the basics of tree care, and to explore the science and work out the links to disease and fungi.

Alongside the real sense of family you get from this book, you also begin to understand nature a little more and it was nice to become more involved in the science of trees and see how the author pushed herself, almost to the point of obsession, with her work and quest for answers. She's not afraid of hard work and getting her hands dirty, and I enjoyed reading about her research, amidst the backdrop of her own personal life, not all of which was positive.

It's almost as if the trees gave her life in the distraction they provided while dealing with sadder times, and her determination and patience is to be admired!!

This book wasn't what I expected at all. I expected a dry research paper style document that I would find interesting, but dull.

It is nothing like that, in that it is interesting for both the topic and th personal history that comes along with it.

Dr Simard is very frank in her writing about her life and it makes fir an entertaining read. I know nothing about bears in the Canadian forests, but feel more informed now.

I also know a lot more about the relationship between trees of same and different species. It seems the natural way, the way that Suzi describes it.

But what she had to go through to do both her research and to have her work published is appalling.

The book is extremely well written and compelling to read. The science fits un naturally as part of the dialogue in the book.

DNF at 40%

After dragging this book in my currently reading list for months, I'll finally admit that I don't think I'll be ever able to finish it.

I requested this book on a whim after I saw a particularly exciting advert for it on Netgalley. I have been deeply interested in nature lately, from trying to get more insight into how fungi work and how plants adapt to changing nature. Finding the Mother Tree absolutely captivated me - I had to also uncover the wisdom and intelligence of the forest.

Prof Suzanne Simard is a very empowering person, and I was interested in her research path especially as I'm deeply tangled with academia as well. The book is also very well written - it is clear that Prof Simard has been writing world-leading publications for a long time, and her prose is impactful.

My issue with Finding the Mother Tree is mainly about the fact that I went in with the wrong expectations. From the title, the illustrated cover and the synopsis I got a feeling that this book is exactly what I have been looking for; a nonfiction about forests that explains their function in an easily understandable way, showing how really magical nature is. Unfortunately the book ended up quite a bit different. Finding the Mother Tree is more Professor Simard's autobiography or a memoir than the whimsical forest-story that I was looking for. I completely understand why the book takes the form of a memoir: all researchers bring their own, complex selves to their research and their findings. It makes sense to explain the results in the context of Prof Simard's life. However, I found myself very impatient with the memoir-parts (that really constituted most of the 40% I read) and frustrated about the limited focus on forests.

Most of all - I struggled with the pacing and explanations in this book. I really liked the writing, but honestly, the detail on forests got very difficult to follow from the very beginning. I have no background in biology - but as a PhD researcher, I was surprised by how inaccessible this book was. I was hoping to read it for pleasure and to awake a feeling that magic lies in all trees, but I started to feel that this book was work. It felt like an odd, autobiographical, well-written academic paper on trees. Like a qualitative thesis. This feeling was intensified by poor pacing in the book. I felt that it took forever to reach that 40%, and I think the book was missing a common thread.

Regardless of my criticism, I suspect that many will fall in love with this as long as they go in with the correct expectations: this is a research memoir, not just an exploration of the magic of forests.

The story of Dr. Suzanne Simard's life's work of understanding the way trees cooperate & work with each other, & educating others on why understanding this can help humans. Alongside others, the author conducted experiments over months & years & discovered the underground network connecting all the trees & plants within a forest. Young plants & trees connected to it will receive nutrients & information from older trees, known here as 'Mother Trees'. Interspersed with stories about the author's family & life, the reader goes on a journey with Simard to the heart of the forest.

This was a difficult read for me due to the fact that I found the attitudes of many of those in charge of the lumber industry so infuriating. The book itself was quite interesting but I found it didn't keep my attention for long periods, I had to read a chapter or two & then come back to it days/weeks later, so it took me quite a while to actually finish it. The author's passion for the subject is conveyed very well though. As I write this review, wildfires are raging in British Columbia & at least one village, Lytton, has been completely destroyed. In the aftermath the cost in terms of both the devastation of human lives & the ecological impact remains to be seen.

Thanks to NetGalley & publishers, Penguin Press UK/Allen Lane, for the opportunity to read an ARC.

It took me forever to finish it probably due to the fact I didn't enjoy it as much as I thought I will.
My first issues was that I was expecting a science/popular science book when in fact this is a memoir that also covers the scientific bits. The second issues is that the writing style didn't do it for me. It was slow and verbose, countless unnecessary details that, as far as I am concerned, worked against the book. At least I've enjoyed the science behind the language of trees and the insight into how it was discovered. It was fascinating to read about the collaboration happening on the forest floor: trees helping their offspring but in particular how they also help other species, as a sort of community. The contribution of fungi to the prosperity of trees is a very interesting and unexpected aspect of the natural world that can only induce wonder! Nature truly is astonishing!


Many thanks for the opportunity to read this!

The author’s enthusiasm for her subject is enchanting in this book, but I think it is a little confused in its intended readership - there is a lot of science for a general reader and probably too much personal stuff for a more scientific volume. I fall into the general reader category and found that the book didn’t hold my attention for very long at a time, as the science was so prominent in the writing. I read it over a period of months in short bursts, and was more able to appreciate Suzanne Simard’s passion for trees and for the vital role they must play if we are to reverse some of the climate change that is destroying our planet. She writes well, but perhaps future work could be more targeted towards a particular audience.

Finding the Mother Tree; Uncovering the Wisdom and Intelligence of the Forest by Suzanne Simard is her story of how she discovered that trees co-operate with each other, to help them all grow more.

This is a very atmospheric book, where you are taken on a journey through woods, to look more closely at trees, and how they grow. 

Suzanne Simard also shares with us how it was as a woman in this field, especially a woman who had ideas that most others thought were ridiculous.  There is scientific information, and you are guided through what this means and why.

I enjoyed this autobiographical story of Suzanne Simard's discoveries, and what they meant, and the effect all of this had on her personal life.  

 Finding the Mother Tree  was published on 4th May 2021 and is available from  Amazon ,  Waterstones  and  Bookshop.org .

You can follow Suzanne Simard on  Instagram  and her  website .  You can watch her talk on ' How trees talk to each other ' which is her TED talk.

I was given this book in exchange for an unbiased review, so my thanks to NetGalley and to  Penguin Books .

In Finding the Mother Tree, Simard has written a book that can only be described as important. Truly important: the kind of book each of us should be reading and passing on to as many other people as possible. Not necessarily for its stylistic qualities – though well crafted and broadly accessible, I found myself a little frustrated at times, particularly in the early chapters, by a certain stiffness in her narration – but, as with The Overstory, for the overall message it imparts. As she charts her life’s work for us, Simard gradually homes in on an attitude she urges us to adopt, showing all the while exactly why it is imperative that we do so. It is, she explains quite simply, ‘a philosophy of treating the world’s creatures, its gifts, as of equal importance to us. This begins by recognizing that trees and plants have agency.’ It’s an idea that may sound far-fetched to the uninitiated, but which by the end of this book seems so right it is almost astonishing that we haven’t all been thinking this way for years.

[...]

Her unfailing sense of wonder and immense love for the natural world radiates from her writing in a manner that can’t fail to infect the reader – at times, as she neared a new discovery or explained her thoughts while they gradually settled into place for her, I found myself absorbed and breathless, filled with eager anticipation despite knowing roughly where her research was leading. And as she warms to her theme, so too does the book seem to ease into itself, the uncertainty of the earlier chapters giving way to a distinct charm.

‘There’s grace in complexity,’ writes Simard, referring to the forest, but Finding the Mother Tree contains plenty of examples on a literary level. The science explored within this book is fairly complex, and I initially had concerns that it might go over my head in places. Yet Simard proves herself to be a patient and engaging teacher, detailing her experiments and the significance of their results in terms that are simple enough for even a committed non-scientist to grasp. [...] Though Finding the Mother Tree is firmly geared towards Simard’s astonishing career, she has done an excellent job of weaving her personal history into her professional life, giving a strong sense of where she comes from and who she is. The granddaughter of loggers, old photos and descriptions of her grandfather’s work give fascinating insights into a long-vanished way of life, while serious illness, bereavement and her own experience of motherhood offer a moving counterpoint to the notion of a mother tree engaging with her family. Anyone expecting straight-up science will not find that here – Simard is too much of an all-rounder not to include her more spiritual connection with the forests she works in – but the overall effect is well balanced and pleasing, allowing each reader to take from the book the aspects she finds most personally appealing.

As much as she tries to convey a sense of herself as an ordinary woman leading an ordinary life – and her tone is certainly down to earth, without any kind of literary affect – there is something quite extraordinary about Finding the Mother Tree and its author. One woman she may be, and her work late to be acknowledged, but Simard has conducted scientific research that truly has the potential to change life on this planet and how we engage with the natural world. It takes more than one tree to make a forest, and more than one voice to effect lasting change, but this book, in its own quiet way, seems to contain the seeds of a revolution.

[excerpted, full review available on my blog]

This book is a fascinating mix of scientific discovery and biography. Dr. Suzanne Simard’s love for trees led to a life devoted to understanding forests. Her fascination, and awe, for the interdependence of plants and mycelial fungi shines through as she plans her experiments and makes her discoveries.

Finding the mother tree entwines Suzanne’s personal story with her scientific discoveries and prove her to be a formidable lady. Her work shows how the mother trees are the true matriarchs of the forest. They are the stalwarts, the survivors that hold forests together and help to keep them healthy. Even in death the mother trees continue to nurture their offspring and the ecosystem that depends upon them. Her research reveals how symbiosis between trees and fungi in the soil allow the sharing of water, nutrients, and chemicals that benefit and even protect trees from infection.

I found Suzanne’s book interesting and thought provoking and finished it marvelling even more at the sheer interconnectedness of life. I will also be applying her wisdom to my garden to improve the health of my own plants and the wildlife they support.

I was given this book from the author via net galley for the pleasure of reading and leaving an honest review should I choose to.

I didn’t know what to expect with this book but the title greatly intrigued me so I thought why not give it a try, I’m so glad I did!

Suzanne Simard is an ecologist who has been incredibly important in more recent discoveries and understanding of trees. She was pioneering in presenting detailed information and knowledge on how trees interact with each other and how social they are, how interlinked and connected different aspects of a forest are and how trees and forests have evolved and adapted while remembering their past too.
Reading this my mind was slightly blown in places. I really had no idea what a network trees and forests have.

The book is part scientific information, part memoir as Simard documents her own life, family history and what she has discovered through her personal discoveries and scientific research. The two angles of this worked well and complimented each other with the human personal aspect bringing home the connectedness of trees and her life stories building bridges between scientific terms and information as well as showing just what goes into research. I thoroughly enjoyed this and it’s definitely inspired me to go away and find out some more. I definitely won’t be looking at trees, woods and forests in the same way again.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Most gardeners will have heard the words mycorrhizal fungi from time to time over the last few years, especially in relation to planting new trees or large shrubs. I had, and didn’t know what fad this was or where it had come from. Thanks to Suzanne’s ground-breaking work (literally, at times) on the forests of Canada, and Sir David Read’s work on plant symbiosis in English meadows, this has become a ‘thing’. More than just helping plants and trees grow; the fungi help trees communicate. Had I heard that when I put sentient trees in my books? I don’t think so. I certainly didn’t envisage what Suzanne Simard did, when she dug in the dirt as a kid and found fungal strands at the base of all the healthy trees around her.

This powerful book, Finding the Mother Tree, sees Prof Simard recall her childhood and the people who influenced her, rooted in the forests of British Columbia. It’s a charming look at a really rough world. People get hurt, regularly, and shrug it off as part of daily life. Suzanne had to be tough to go into the forestry world. Especially when all her senses and upbringing told her what was happening, the Government’s plans for clear-felling and erasing native flora, was wrong, wrong, wrong. Her journey into research and more research, and her doctorate, and her subsequent run-ins with the local forestry law-enforcers, makes engrossing reading. Especially for anyone trying to influence wrong-headed policy makers.

It is also a step-by-step guide to making robust research plans, and to the thought process necessary to see through the data into the connections. To eliminate the impossible, and understand what you have left. At times it is a little heavy handed, and occasionally I was convinced she was repeating herself. But that can be forgiven.

Finding the Mother Tree is an excellent guide to why and how the trees in the world are connected, how Suzanne Simard discovered it, and what we should be doing to give them the best chance of saving us from ourselves. I feel richer for the experience.

Her voice in this book is wonderful, she takes you into universe of the trees and fungi and the huge network of life within the forest floor. You experience it as she did, and her energy and passion are extraordinary. I wanted to read it because of the similarity between her and the character in The Overstory, and that gave it even more depth and magic because of how i felt I already 'knew' her; fiction then fact. And the fact is amazing - the voice and depth of perception and how Simard connects it all to the wider world. You'll never experience a walk in any kind of nature, especially trees, without an extra level of attunedness and even closeness, again.

I downloaded this thinking it was a scientific account of the authors work. It is in fact, a charming autobiography from someone who know the woods intimately and has come to understand them even better. The insight into bygone times are fascinating. Part story, part scientific description, I enjoyed it very much.

I have been reading a lot about trees over the past few years and this book is where it has been leading. It started with fiction: The Overstory by Richard Powers where one of the four protagonist’s work closely resembles Suzanne Simard’s and she is said to be the inspiration for the character. I then demolished the all popular science books I could find on the subject the best of which are The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben and Entangled Life by Merlin Sheldrake which were both great so reading this book is a natural progression and straight from the proverbial horses mouth.

Part memoir of growing up in Ontario, Canada and part treaties into how trees have been mismanaged over the years. The narrative spans her entire working life from her first summer job working in the Canadian Forestry service to her professorship at the university. The way she tell it she has been battling her whole working life to make the men (it’s always men) who make the policies, see what they have been trying not to, the need to change. The policy of clear cutting whole swathes of forest is something which has proven to be extremely problematic on so many levels and its hard to see why the forestry service clung onto it for dear life for so long.

Unfortunately the copy I had from netgalley all the numbers and the drop caps at the beginning of paragraphs was missing so I may have lost a bit of the detail, but the published versions won’t have that problem.

What I liked:
The details of the experiments she did over the years both alone and with her graduate students to prove her theory.
The passion with which she talks about it all.
Her personality shines through her writing.
What didn't work for me:
She does go a little heavy handed with the need to force emotions onto trees.
Her writing style got a bit dry by the end.
Suitable For: Anybody with an interest in trees and ecology.

This is easily the best memoir I have read in a long time. I was hooked after the first couple of lines - 'For generations my family has made its living cutting down forests. Our survival has depended on this humble trade.' That is not the opening I was expecting. I was expecting a book extolling the virtue of trees, talking about problems associated with deforestation and climate change and yet the opening seems to talk positively about cutting trees down. It makes sense when you read on. What follows is fascinating and documents the lifes work (to date) of the author Suzanne Simard.

Prior to reading this I had not heard of Suzanne Simard. I live in the UK (the book is based in Canada and the USA) and I do not work in forestry. But that doesn't matter. This book is a great mix of personal memoir and scientific study. Suzanne starts out in a junior role in the forestry service at a time when 'clear cutting' and removing all ground cover shrubs and grasses to replant a single species as a monoculture was the policy. She knew the policy was wrong and sets about to prove it. Study by study, evidence emerges over the course of many years.

One of the things I found most interesting in this book is the amount of studies and research required over many years in order to influence change. It felt like a breakthrough when a post graduate student came along who specifically sought to work with Suzanne as their research was along similar lines and then another researcher was mentioned who had taken a study and expanded upon it. By the end of the book you have an awareness of this extraordinary body of work, each study adding something more to the previous one.

It culminates with an explanation of this idea of a mother tree - the oldest and largest tree in a plantation which is supporting the other trees around it with water and nutrients. One study identified a mother tree which was linked to forty seven other trees. I like that. I have found myself walking in our local forest looking for mother trees - they are very difficult to identify when most of the surrounding trees are enormous oak and beech trees!

Alongside all the science, study and work is the story of Suzanne's family. She reflects on her childhood and how that has influenced her adult life. She marries, has children, makes difficult decisions about work life balance, separates and fights cancer. Somehow all of this is covered within the same pages.

This book is recommended reading to anyone who is interested in nature and specifically trees. It sits well alongside books which tell us why being in nature and walking under trees is good for our health. But it is not really about that. This book is much more focused on the trees themselves and their needs. I read an e-book but my personal preference would be a hard backed, physical book. There are photographs throughout the book and these don't work so well in an e-book - much better to be able to linger over the photos in a real book. It would be a book I would treasure.

Thank you to NetGalley for an early copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

A deeply personal memoir combined with groundbreaking scientific research, Suzanne Simard guides us through the insights she has gained into the interconnectivity of forests and their impact on biodiversity and climate change. From her childhood growing up in the forests of the Canadian province of British Columbia, Suzanne started working in the forest service before moving into academic research to investigate her belief that the natural support network within forests meant that the clear-cutting and free-to-grow methodologies were inherently flawed. Although her research increasingly highlighted the need for reform, the combination of going against the status quo, the long life cycle of forests, and being female, meant her findings were initially dismissed and ridiculed. Thanks to her work we now have a much better understanding of the complexities of the relationships and life cycle of forests.

Fascinating! A very interesting biographical account linked to Suzanne’s amazing research and career. What an incredible lady! The depth of her dedication and passion for trees and their well being is astounding.

The autobiography of a young girl growing up in the rain forests of British Columbia who finds a job with the forestry dept that is charged with the growing and farming of valuable trees from the forest. Inspired by her observation that clearing the forest of all vegetation and planting saplings in regimented rows resulted in many cases saplings to not prosper and to died; caused her to believe the practise was counterproductive. With her empathy with the forest, she was inspired to devote her life into research on the ecology of the forest. She had to fight all her life to save the forest from wrong practices in the farming of trees before the weight of research evidence won the day; becoming a Professor of Forest Ecology after establishing the fact that trees talk to each other so as to support and help each other via an underground of entwined roots supported by colonies of attached fugus. She also established that the old ancient trees become mother trees preferentially feed their own seedlings as well as other trees. Concluding that the earth can only survive global warming by caring for each other both in the world and in each other. A most relevant observation pertinent to how we all need to changeto save ourselves in the world today