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The Abounding Queerness of Nature
by Patricia Ononiwu Kaishian
A thrilling book about the abounding queerness of the natural world that challenges our expectations of what is normal, beautiful, and possible.
Growing up, Patricia Ononiwu Kaishian felt most at home in the swamps and culverts near her house in the Hudson Valley. A child who frequently felt out of place, too much of one thing or not enough of another, she found acceptance in these settings, among other amphibious beings. In snakes, snails, and, above all, fungi, she saw her own developing identities as a queer, neurodivergent person reflected back at her—and in them, too, she found a personal path to a life of science.
Braiding her personal story with science, Kaishian shows us this making of a scientist and introduces readers to the queerness of all the life around us. Fungal species, we learn, commonly encompass more than two biological sexes—and some as many as twenty-three thousand. Some intersex slugs mutually fire calcium carbonate "love darts" at each other during courtship. Glass eels are sexually undetermined until their last year of life, a mystery that scientists once dubbed "the eel question." Nature, Kaishian shows us, is filled with the unusual, the overlooked, and the marginalized—and they have lessons for us all.
Wide-ranging, richly observant, and full of surprises, Forest Euphoria will open your eyes and change how you look at the world.
"A liberating nature text that finds level ground and interrelatedness between humble microbes and the swirling cosmos, all abounding in queerness." —Foreword Reviews (starred review)
"Fascinating ... Reverent ... The lyrical prose imbues the scientific discussions with a sense of wonder [and] will leave readers in awe of nature's many splendors." —Publishers Weekly
"Nothing short of stunning ... Kaishian achieves something truly singular. She establishes a kaleidoscopic vision of interconnectedness that encompasses intricate webs of communication and cooperation, while acknowledging that much always remains to be discovered. Not remotely dry, Forest Euphoria is an evocative work of profound creativity that combines scientific rigor, personal narrative, and a call for an outlook that is better, more inclusive, more true and genuinely scientific." —Shelf Awareness
"With immense knowledge, grace, experience, and lyrical prose ... Kaishian persuades us that there is never just one way for living things in the natural world to reproduce or evolve or interact." —Kirkus Reviews
"[A] boundary-busting debut ... Kaishian understands how other—and othered—organisms are closer to the human world than we typically think. It is a message gorgeously delivered: Kaishian possesses a poet's understanding of lyricism and language, and her writing invites you to sink into a pool of wonder. I cannot think of anything better we ought to be doing right now." —BookPage
"If the first lesson in how to love nature is learning to see yourself in it—and to see it in you—then Forest Euphoria is a master class in how to love the world. Whether our fellow inhabitants of this wild island planet are tiny or grand, plain or gorgeous, deceptively simple or mind-bogglingly complex, Patricia Ononiwu Kaishian is in love with them all. And her racing, bounding, arms-wide-open enthusiasm teaches us how to love them, too, in their full, astonishing diversity." —Margaret Renkl, New York Times bestselling author of The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year
"Forest Euphoria issues a joyous invitation to live with curiosity and love, and what could be a greater gift? I felt this invitation in the book's scientific rigor; in its attention to the sophisticated affinity of all life; in its exacting work to orient a reader to the symmetries, puzzlements, and delights of our world." —Megha Majumdar, New York Times bestselling author of A Burning
This information about Forest Euphoria was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Patricia Ononiwu Kaishian is the curator of mycology at the New York State Museum, as well as faculty with the Bard Prison Initiative. Kaishian earned her PhD from SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry. She lives in the Hudson Valley.
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