Publisher’s Weekly: starred review
“Burke’s writing is as lush as the environment of Pax; her characters show considerable depth, and she unflinchingly captures the horrors of space exploration. She has rendered an alien planet in beautiful, believable detail.”
Barnes & Noble
“Semiosis is a fascinating exploration of community alongside truly stunning worldbuilding, making the case that our notion of “community” can and should include much more than just the people next door.”
Goodreads
Rating and review page
“A fantastic, high-concept novel that addresses the question ‘what if a first-contact story, but with plants?’” – Emily
Kirkus
“Every chapter is like a short story within a shared universe—and it’s a phenomenal universe. The worldbuilding is astonishing: the human society is richly detailed, and it’s riveting to watch the colonists learn to communicate with a life-form so different from us.”
Kirkus Review: Of Plants and Men, a featured review
“Each subsequent chapter is from the perspective of a character from a different generation, spanning over a century, each reading almost like its own branch of the same story—all of it rooted on exploring life in a new planet, examining what it means to develop a new society in difficult circumstances and surrounded by life more alien than anyone could ever have imagined.”
Mysterious Galaxy Books
“As her characters struggle to survive in the alien world, they must inevitably give up their old earth-derived ideologies, social institutions, and finally their very biology. Immigrants into a new natural reality, they undergo the most radical of melting pots, and become something wholly other and strange. Brilliant and thought-provoking.”
Christian Science Monitor
“Semiosis unfolds the old science fiction idea of first contact in ways that are both traditional and subversive; we watch not just the initial bewildering encounters but the slow, gradual entwining of two worlds.”
SFRevu
“Semiosis is told in first person, but that person changes each chapter. I often find that an annoying device, but here it works very well. Each chapter tells the story from one member of each successive generation’s viewpoint, and that allows us to examine inter- and intra-generational conflicts along with the external threats to the Pacifists.”
Toronto Star
“As the settler community adapts to life on Pax they enter into a co-operative relationship with Stevland, which leads to some interesting observations on the building of complex social systems from the ground up and the dangers of trying to direct the process of evolution.”
Science Friday: Six Bestselling Authors Share Their Favorite “Other Worlds.” Scroll down to David Brin.
“In her novel Semiosis, Sue Burke portrays desperate human colonists becoming dependent upon a planet’s highest life form, a sapient vine that spreads with their nervous help.”
Tor Book Reviews
“Each of Burke’s characters come to life as individuals: she has an excellent grasp of voice and characterisation.” (Beware: spoilers.)
The Verge
(Beware: more spoilers.) “More libertarian strains of science fiction might have argued that humanity has a duty to remain free of outside influences and thus reject the social and chemical engineering that the plants can use on people. However, Burke takes the story in another direction, showing off the beginnings of a civilization that is built on mutual trust and understanding, rather than a more go-it-alone one.”
Biblio Sanctum
“The world-building was phenomenal and extremely convincing, as though I was truly transported to an alien planet, encountering organisms that felt vaguely familiar and yet unlike anything I’d ever seen before. This sensation was at once unsettling and exciting.”
For winter nights
“The themes are huge! There’s a great deal going on to think about and, as the clever novel continues, one character in particular tests everybody’s ability to understand the signs and symbols around them – the semiosis that is so crucial on Pax if society is to evolve. It is all absolutely fascinating and thoroughly engaging.”
Semiosis 