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My novel Semiosis was released by Tor a month ago, and here’s some of the latest news and reviews.

I wrote an article about writing non-human points of view at Unbound Worlds: “…plants lead lives of quiet desperation, in constant combat using a variety of weapons.”

At the signing at Anderson’s Bookstore in La Grange, Illinois, I talked about what would happen if I could practice photosynthesis. You can see a video of the 5-minute talk here and read the short essay here.

Today, at Lawrence Schoen’s blog Eating Authors, I describe my most memorable meal – a snack at the Eiffel Tower that proved something essential about the French people.

You can read an interview of me by Sean McLachlan, who helped me write the book as a beta reader, at Black Gate, and an interview by Paul Semel.

There are reviews at Christian Science Monitor, Biblio Sanctum, Kirkus Review: Of Plants and Men, a featured review, The Perks of Books video review, Open Letters Review, and Lynn’s Book Blog Friday Firsts.

(A brief, moralizing rant cut from the original manuscript because the book was getting too long.)

Sadly, I am the only one of my species. In addition to genetic advantages, sexual reproduction provides certain physical pleasures, and thus some hedonistic plants are self-pollinating despite the congenital defects that often occur; self-pollinators must make many seeds to ensure a reasonable number of healthy ones.

More abstemiously, I create asexual, agamospermic inflorescences whose always-healthy seeds result from modified meiotic division of the chromosomes inside the reproductive cells in virgin ovaries, rather than through fertilization by my own pollen. Some genetic crossover occurs, providing a certain amount of variation, although the offspring are very nearly clones. It is the best I can hope for, being alone.

Instead, I use flowers and pollen mostly for other purposes: pollen for communication, and flowers for the sheer beauty.

(This is a section that was cut from the manuscript because the book was getting lengthy.)

Human meteorologists tell me that rain comes as the result of vast movements in the air that bring warmer or cooler, and wetter or drier air masses from here to there, and that the heat from sunshine powers these movements. But the meteorologists are Sun worshippers, and thus they will see the Sun as the causative factor behind everything. The same humans assure me that planets without water are dead, though the Sun shines on them. They do not make the obvious conclusion: Water is life.

I inherited a root that identifies a god of water, a vast animal that lives in the oceans and whose minions are other animals, in particular large intelligent ones, clearly a superstition by its irrationality and ignorance, and the elaborate stories in the root concerning the water god and its minions obscure the facts about water and animals. The stories allege that god sends water to help its animals and that the animals can petition for rain, so I must win the favor of the animals and keep them near. Even less sophisticated plants hold large, intelligent animals in a certain appreciation that points to awe.

It is true that in times of drought, many animals die, go dormant, or leave; animals, especially large intelligent ones, make up a minute part of the biomass of life and their presence is an indicator of water, but it is not a causative agent. Animals irrigate their favored plants, so animals do control water to an extent, and the idea that currying favor with those animals brings the blessing of water is true only in its most mundane sense. The human meteorologists can predict the rain, and with that information, they and we intelligent plants can make plans accordingly.

But water moves as it will, a god of total power that feeds on the Sun’s energy just as we plants do, a god that permeates all life but whose life differs from mine the way a fire differs from the Sun. I must accept its acts, whether helpful or harmful, always impersonal, and I must cope as rationality gives me the tools.

Water may not have sent the human animals, but water has allowed me to grow and understand their role. The belief that animals were divine agents did not prevent us bamboo from slaughtering them in the past; in fact, it may have encouraged it, because to kill an enemy’s minions is to harm the enemy and help oneself, even if the deaths occur so far away that their bodies’ iron cannot be savored. Being divine may be a curse. Humans are mundane, fortunately, yet they are valued not only by me but by other plants.

As you know, my novel Semiosis was released last week to all the fanfare Tor and I could muster. Here are some recent highlights:

You can read reviews (beware, spoilers) by Liz Bourke, and at The Verge.

I wrote a column about the novel for John Scalzi’s Big Idea series at his blog, Whatever, asking: Who is in charge of the plant where you live? There’s also an interview at MyLifeMyBooksMyEscape.com.

In celebration of that, there have been some interviews and posts around the internet.

At the Tor/Forge blog, I answer the question of whether your neglected houseplants want revenge. Short answer: no. Consider the fate of the osage orange…

At Mary Robinette Kowal’s website, I share “My Favorite Bit” about Semiosis.

At the Chicago Review of Books, I talk about where science fiction writers get their ideas, and how Semiosis started with my houseplants.

SFRevu has a review of Semiosis and an interview with me.

At Shelf Awareness, there’s a review of the book and an interview.

At the Cartesian Theatre, Andrew Leon Hudson asks me some questions, not all of them somber and serious.

The Qwillery has an interview asking writing-related questions.

A review in Spanish is at the Dreams of Elvex blog.

The French have a name for it: a novel that tells the story of an individual, family, or society across several generations. It’s a roman-fleuve.

Merriam-Webster offers its official definition of roman-fleuve.

Wikipedia discusses the roman-fleuve within the post on “novel sequences” and offers examples.

A.Word.A.Day explains that the word comes from the French words roman (novel) and fleuve (river). Its earliest document use in English is 1936, although they were being written earlier than that.

A thirteen-second YouTube video will teach you how to say it with impeccable French pronunciation.

Finally, author Jeffrey Archer recommends ten romans-fleuves (note the plural).

By the way, you can pre-order a signed copy of Semiosis from Volumes Bookcafe in Chicago — and they ship anywhere.

Available here.

The artwork on the cover of the novel Semiosis is from a photo of the leaves of a Drosera, commonly called a sundew, a carnivorous plant. The pretty little droplets on the stalks are glue — sweet glue like drops of nectar to attract and trap insects. Other glands on the stalk secrete digestive fluids to dissolve nutrients, which the plant then absorbs.

You can find sundews on every continent but Antarctica. The photo above depicts a Drosera rotundifolia, a widespread species, which happens to grow in the Chicago area, where I live.

Like many carnivorous plants, sundews usually grow in moist, sunny locations such as bogs and marshes. The plant needs animal nutrients to make up for deficiencies in the soil. Most are small, but some of the 194 species can reach a meter tall (which is scary). Some are vinelike, others form rosettes or long stalks, and their colors vary.

They’re designed to look attractive to bugs, although human collectors find them fascinating, too. The hapless insect lands on the sparkling leaf and gets stuck. It struggles against the glue, which makes the stalks bend quickly to hold it tighter, and some species even curl their leaves to grip their meal.

The Botany Society of America can tell you more about Drosera. Wikipedia has even more detailed information.

Watch them at work on YouTube, and you’ll feel sorry for the flies.

Are their carnivorous plants in Semiosis? Yes, more than one kind. Most of the plants aren’t hungry for animal prey, though. And a few are merely murderous.

Will you like the novel Semiosis? Here’s one way to decide.

Tor has posted Chapter 1 as a sneak peek. You can read it here:

https://www.torforgeblog.com/2018/01/02/sneak-peek-semiosis-by-sue-burke/