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Object Lessons
Mushroom
Object Lessons is a series of short, beautifully designed books about the hidden lives of ordinary things.
They are the things we step on without noticing and the largest organisms on Earth. They are symbols of inexplicable growth and excruciating misery. They are grouped with plants, but they behave more like animals. In their inscrutability, mushrooms are wondrous organisms.
The mushroom is an ordinary object whose encounters with humans are usually limited to a couple of species prepackaged at the grocery store. This book offers mushrooms as much more than a pasta ingredient or trendy coffee alternative. It presents these objects as the firmament for life as we know it, enablers of mystical traditions, menders of minds lost to depression. But it acknowledges, too, that this firmament only exists because of death and rot.
Rummaging through philosophical, literary, medical , ecological , and anthropological texts only serves to confirm what the average forager already that mushrooms are to be regarded with a reverence deserving of only the most powerful those who create and destroy, and thrive on both.
Object Lessons is published in partnership with an essay series in The Atlantic.
They are the things we step on without noticing and the largest organisms on Earth. They are symbols of inexplicable growth and excruciating misery. They are grouped with plants, but they behave more like animals. In their inscrutability, mushrooms are wondrous organisms.
The mushroom is an ordinary object whose encounters with humans are usually limited to a couple of species prepackaged at the grocery store. This book offers mushrooms as much more than a pasta ingredient or trendy coffee alternative. It presents these objects as the firmament for life as we know it, enablers of mystical traditions, menders of minds lost to depression. But it acknowledges, too, that this firmament only exists because of death and rot.
Rummaging through philosophical, literary, medical , ecological , and anthropological texts only serves to confirm what the average forager already that mushrooms are to be regarded with a reverence deserving of only the most powerful those who create and destroy, and thrive on both.
Object Lessons is published in partnership with an essay series in The Atlantic.
- GenresNonfictionPhilosophy
149 pages, Kindle Edition
Published December 15, 2022
1 person is currently reading
62 people want to read
About the author
Sara Rich
11 books36 followersSara Rich grew up in rural Kansas, where she started writing short stories and poetry at the age of six. Nowadays, she writes weird and allohistorical fiction and has authored and illustrated childrens' books in English and Dutch (under the pseudonym Ann Henri). Her nonfiction works and illustrations have been published in numerous magazines and scholarly journals. Sara's dark fiction shorts have been featured by publishers of literary journals and anthologies based in the UK, Belgium, the US, and Cyprus. She earned a BFA in Studio Art from the University of Kansas (2003), an MA in Art History from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (2008), and a PhD in Ancient Near Eastern Studies at the University of Leuven in Belgium (2013). After living in Belgium and the UK for 8 years, she has returned to the US and now teaches at Appalachian State University in North Carolina.
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Displaying 1 - 26 of 26 reviews
January 6, 2023
I have been hit and miss in my reactions to the OBJECT LESSONS series, though certainly leaning more toward the hit than the miss (the one prior to this one — Blue Jeans — for instance, was one of my favorites in the series). Unfortunately, this most recent title, Mushroom by Sara Rich fell into the miss category for me.
Every now and then one issue that crops up is a matter of expectations. To be honest, I expected a lot more about, well, mushrooms, I this text than I got. Or perhaps a better way to put it is I expected more concrete information about mushrooms. Instead, It’s more a wide-ranging mix of philosophy, religion, symbol, and metaphor. This isn’t a complaint — authors write their books, not mine — but it’s something readers should know going in. This isn’t, for example, a book like Merlin Sheldrake’s Entangled Life, a book that does get cited here (and is highly, highly recommended), and one which is more concrete and pragmatic in its exploration.
As well as more conversational in tone. You’re unlikely for instance to find sentence likes these in Sheldrake’s work:
The progenerative fundament common to the religious Medieval experience slowly drifted out of the theophilosophical and scientific mainstream … a renewed religious zealotry that retaliated against the animistic ontological flattening of many colonized peoples.
“There is a way that anthropomorphic metaphor can le to interspecies isomorphic revelation”
Again, this is not a complaint; it’s a book that requires more attention than some, but it’s hardly impenetrable. It’s more a question of personal preference; I assume you’ll know where you fall on the above sort of writing.
A bigger issue I had was the speculative nature of some of what Rich presents, with some claims that are unsupported beyond opinion for the most part. To be fair, Rich presents them as unsupported (or at least not fully so), with lines like “these tentative clinical confirmations” or “of course, all these medicinal foods . . . do far more . . . yet, despite some spurious base assumptions,” or “reportedly, village shamans may have shared” (where “reportedly” is carrying a lot of weight). And some of the points beyond the unsupported ones felt like more than a bit of a stretch.
Structurally, the work felt disjointed and a bit scattered, and this combined with the above issues made this a work I can’t recommend, though if this is your first title in this series, I do recommend giving others a try.
Every now and then one issue that crops up is a matter of expectations. To be honest, I expected a lot more about, well, mushrooms, I this text than I got. Or perhaps a better way to put it is I expected more concrete information about mushrooms. Instead, It’s more a wide-ranging mix of philosophy, religion, symbol, and metaphor. This isn’t a complaint — authors write their books, not mine — but it’s something readers should know going in. This isn’t, for example, a book like Merlin Sheldrake’s Entangled Life, a book that does get cited here (and is highly, highly recommended), and one which is more concrete and pragmatic in its exploration.
As well as more conversational in tone. You’re unlikely for instance to find sentence likes these in Sheldrake’s work:
The progenerative fundament common to the religious Medieval experience slowly drifted out of the theophilosophical and scientific mainstream … a renewed religious zealotry that retaliated against the animistic ontological flattening of many colonized peoples.
“There is a way that anthropomorphic metaphor can le to interspecies isomorphic revelation”
Again, this is not a complaint; it’s a book that requires more attention than some, but it’s hardly impenetrable. It’s more a question of personal preference; I assume you’ll know where you fall on the above sort of writing.
A bigger issue I had was the speculative nature of some of what Rich presents, with some claims that are unsupported beyond opinion for the most part. To be fair, Rich presents them as unsupported (or at least not fully so), with lines like “these tentative clinical confirmations” or “of course, all these medicinal foods . . . do far more . . . yet, despite some spurious base assumptions,” or “reportedly, village shamans may have shared” (where “reportedly” is carrying a lot of weight). And some of the points beyond the unsupported ones felt like more than a bit of a stretch.
Structurally, the work felt disjointed and a bit scattered, and this combined with the above issues made this a work I can’t recommend, though if this is your first title in this series, I do recommend giving others a try.
January 8, 2023
A rhythmic foray into the world of an inscrutable and wondrous organism. This book goes beyond mushrooms as a pasta ingredient or trendy coffee alternative to present them as the firmament for life as we know it. They are enablers of mystical traditions, menders of minds lost to depression, and symbols of inexplicable growth and excruciating misery. But it acknowledges too, that this firmament only exists because of death and rot. This book is a part of a series, Object Lessons, about hidden lives of ordinary things. The author uses the seasons and describes mushrooms for each season. She says that “if an insect likes a mushroom, humans will too.” I enjoyed this book and know that you will too. I learned a lot about mushrooms and which ones are edible. Thanks to NetGalley and Bloomsbury Academic for a copy for an honest review.
January 29, 2023
*This book was received as an Advanced Reader's Copy from NetGalley.
This was my first book in the Object Lessons series. I didn't really know what to expect. The description makes it seem as if it takes mundane objects and reveals them in detail. And I guess that's what happened here, but maybe not in the way that I thought it would.
In Mushroom, Rich separates the story of the mushroom into two parts, per season, repeating seasons. The first part usually details some information on a particular mushroom, her experiences foraging it, and maybe some information on preparation/taste. The second part varies wildly; it ultimately looks at the mushroom through sociological/philosophical connotations.
I don't think this book is for the average person going in and reading about mushrooms. Trying to read it out loud was like doing a tongue twister. Lots of pretty, academic words jumbled into a mix. It bounced around so much as well, especially in those second parts. In one minute, we could be talking about nuclear fallout, in the next, the religious tendencies of Stamets. In other ways, the book seemed like a memoir of Rich's experiences. None of this is a bad thing, but again, not what I was expecting in a book presumably about mushrooms.
I will say that it had some nice imagery in it and the artist in me now has a few thoughts for creating. But overall, I'm not sure this was a great introduction into the Object Lesson series, if indeed most are about the objects themselves and less the writer.
Review by M. Reynard 2023
This was my first book in the Object Lessons series. I didn't really know what to expect. The description makes it seem as if it takes mundane objects and reveals them in detail. And I guess that's what happened here, but maybe not in the way that I thought it would.
In Mushroom, Rich separates the story of the mushroom into two parts, per season, repeating seasons. The first part usually details some information on a particular mushroom, her experiences foraging it, and maybe some information on preparation/taste. The second part varies wildly; it ultimately looks at the mushroom through sociological/philosophical connotations.
I don't think this book is for the average person going in and reading about mushrooms. Trying to read it out loud was like doing a tongue twister. Lots of pretty, academic words jumbled into a mix. It bounced around so much as well, especially in those second parts. In one minute, we could be talking about nuclear fallout, in the next, the religious tendencies of Stamets. In other ways, the book seemed like a memoir of Rich's experiences. None of this is a bad thing, but again, not what I was expecting in a book presumably about mushrooms.
I will say that it had some nice imagery in it and the artist in me now has a few thoughts for creating. But overall, I'm not sure this was a great introduction into the Object Lesson series, if indeed most are about the objects themselves and less the writer.
Review by M. Reynard 2023
January 9, 2023
“If agency is a marker of consciousness, we are forced to admit that not only are fungi conscious, but so too are plants, slime molds, bacteria, and viruses, who communicate sensations, decisions, and strategies, and who can solve problems altruistically. It might even be concluded that they maintain a level of dignity, in that they form their own laws to govern their actions.”
This book is part of a book series called Object Lessons, which covers the hidden life of ordinary things and is published by Bloomsbury Academic. The author, Sara Rich, is an assistant professor of Coastal Carolina University’s HTC Honors Program. It is unclear if this author has any relevant experience or expertise in mycology, but it should be noted that pseudoscience is one of her teaching areas and speculative writing and speculative philosophy are among her research areas. Her bio’s publication credits include hauntography and fabulation genres, and her personal website expands on that. I lay this foundation not as criticism but to establish an understanding of this author’s oeuvre, as it will be useful.
With this background out of the way, what about this mini-monograph, Mushroom? Well, to say it’s about fungi would be accurate in a broad sense. Mostly, it is a work of either pseudoscience or speculative philosophy that revisits a well-trodden path: that religion is a sea anchor for scientific advancement. In this book, religion rises to the level of an interminable virus that has infected the hearts and minds of scientists and the common man alike for millennia. Capitalism runs a close second.
The author has many more things to say than what is examined here. She will provide a few personal stories and interesting tidbits about mushrooms (the Brazilian zombie ant fungus will forever change how you view marionettes!) then work her way into a hot topic—climate change—with unfortunate brevity. But for me, at least, this book offers only one fresh albeit speculative insight into the subject of fungi: that they are sentient, or should be seen as such.
I’m going to step out on a limb and take Rich seriously here, although I question this choice given her penchant for self‐conscious verbal artifice. At the very least, it will be a way to move this review forward.
To begin this metaforage, Rich argues that the Crusades— “make-Europa-great-again campaigns”—led to a renewed interest in classic texts, including Aristotle’s De Anima. “One such reverberation is the flawed understanding of the nature of our biodiverse planet, and by extension, the types of souls that form or inhabit the different kinds of bodies.” Aristotle’s view of the soul is biological in nature and places plants and fungi in the vegetative class, which Rich complains puts them just one rung above a tea kettle and dismisses them as “lowly nutritive souls, feeding and reproducing but fully incapable of either sensation or reason.”
She will build her case on this foundation, but I argue that we should go easy on Aristotle. De Anima was written in the fourth century. Modern technology such as microscopes and DNA sequencing that help identify taxonomically similar species were centuries away. These tools now play a significant role in the evolving system of biological classification. Indeed, fungi were granted their own kingdom decades ago. Why Rich focuses on Aristotle and later the medieval Great Chain of Being and does not comment on current science is unclear, except that it would collapse the argument that religion has created a reverberation of a flawed understanding of fungi’s place in the biological hierarchy.
Rich says that the organization of lifeforms, “from least to most ensouled,” trickled into Christian theology over the ages.” This began when De Anima got into the hands of Abrahamic religions who believed “each step, link, or rung is locked, confined to its design as the Almighty intended.” This has unfairly rendered fungi “insensate, insentient, sessile, and essentially expendable … opposite the pallid man at the pinnacle, who lords over the others while boasting of divine proximity.” Rich will make a reductive argument that “an overemphasis on bloodshed as sacrifice can only be the product of a longstanding ontological hierarchy that places animal life on a level above other kinds.”
In Rich’s view, religion is at the core of misperceptions and negative associations that have blinded people to fungi’s true nature and capacity. Mushrooms are “increasingly associated with the immorals [sic] of poverty, female sexuality, witchery, and otherworldly hallucinations… Perhaps it was fear and revulsion of the erotic explosions from the earth … [that] unjustly cast mushrooms so far down the hierarchy of existence, deep into heretical realms.”
Rich states that fungi have personalities and possess the capacity for learning, memory, cognition. No observations, research, or even antidotes are offered to support these claims. It is an unfortunate missed opportunity that neither the author nor editors considered that readers would be delighted to see examples of how a mushroom might exhibit behavior that can be viewed as greedy or grouchy or altruistic. Speculative philosophy, if that’s what this book is, does not bother with such things as evidence. It foregoes empiricism and the foundational scientific method. It relies on intuition and, oddly, insights into the nature of the Absolute or Divine.
This book series is intended for both academic and everyday readers, including book clubs. But I wonder if anyone beyond a niche segment of academia and those who seek fabulation or fantasy fiction will be interested in this work. There is a market for it, but the marketing literature is not helping put this book into the right hands, which is unfortunate for Rich. Assuming this is written in her preferred style, then she has done a fine job and this book should be steered to those who will appreciate it. I am not one of them.
Without the anchoring familiarity of having read past books in this series, there is no framework with which to judge how this book fits within it. It is filled with notional claims presented as fact and written with the zeal and passion of a disciple, but of what? Myco-theology, mushroom metaphysics. The hint as to what this means will not help us understand the relationship between religion and mushrooms, or their history, nature, abilities, and specialness, but it will help us understand Sara Rich—
“For a myco-theologian, sacrifice is slitting the throat of excess and eviscerating toxic waste. Sacrifice is letting go of consumer impulses and the asinine optimism of capitalism. Sacrifice is doing the hard work yourself without expecting others, whether blue collar or indigo milk cap, to follow behind and clean up after your mess. No blood, no martyrs; no slaves, no masters.”
I do hope this new theology will help her find a home in this universe. For now, she has the following to say:
“I am something of a shameless misanthrope, a self-loathing human in the new geological era of our own making, the Misanthropocene. My pessimism needs a cure.”
Many thanks to NetGalley for providing this ARC.
This book is part of a book series called Object Lessons, which covers the hidden life of ordinary things and is published by Bloomsbury Academic. The author, Sara Rich, is an assistant professor of Coastal Carolina University’s HTC Honors Program. It is unclear if this author has any relevant experience or expertise in mycology, but it should be noted that pseudoscience is one of her teaching areas and speculative writing and speculative philosophy are among her research areas. Her bio’s publication credits include hauntography and fabulation genres, and her personal website expands on that. I lay this foundation not as criticism but to establish an understanding of this author’s oeuvre, as it will be useful.
With this background out of the way, what about this mini-monograph, Mushroom? Well, to say it’s about fungi would be accurate in a broad sense. Mostly, it is a work of either pseudoscience or speculative philosophy that revisits a well-trodden path: that religion is a sea anchor for scientific advancement. In this book, religion rises to the level of an interminable virus that has infected the hearts and minds of scientists and the common man alike for millennia. Capitalism runs a close second.
The author has many more things to say than what is examined here. She will provide a few personal stories and interesting tidbits about mushrooms (the Brazilian zombie ant fungus will forever change how you view marionettes!) then work her way into a hot topic—climate change—with unfortunate brevity. But for me, at least, this book offers only one fresh albeit speculative insight into the subject of fungi: that they are sentient, or should be seen as such.
I’m going to step out on a limb and take Rich seriously here, although I question this choice given her penchant for self‐conscious verbal artifice. At the very least, it will be a way to move this review forward.
To begin this metaforage, Rich argues that the Crusades— “make-Europa-great-again campaigns”—led to a renewed interest in classic texts, including Aristotle’s De Anima. “One such reverberation is the flawed understanding of the nature of our biodiverse planet, and by extension, the types of souls that form or inhabit the different kinds of bodies.” Aristotle’s view of the soul is biological in nature and places plants and fungi in the vegetative class, which Rich complains puts them just one rung above a tea kettle and dismisses them as “lowly nutritive souls, feeding and reproducing but fully incapable of either sensation or reason.”
She will build her case on this foundation, but I argue that we should go easy on Aristotle. De Anima was written in the fourth century. Modern technology such as microscopes and DNA sequencing that help identify taxonomically similar species were centuries away. These tools now play a significant role in the evolving system of biological classification. Indeed, fungi were granted their own kingdom decades ago. Why Rich focuses on Aristotle and later the medieval Great Chain of Being and does not comment on current science is unclear, except that it would collapse the argument that religion has created a reverberation of a flawed understanding of fungi’s place in the biological hierarchy.
Rich says that the organization of lifeforms, “from least to most ensouled,” trickled into Christian theology over the ages.” This began when De Anima got into the hands of Abrahamic religions who believed “each step, link, or rung is locked, confined to its design as the Almighty intended.” This has unfairly rendered fungi “insensate, insentient, sessile, and essentially expendable … opposite the pallid man at the pinnacle, who lords over the others while boasting of divine proximity.” Rich will make a reductive argument that “an overemphasis on bloodshed as sacrifice can only be the product of a longstanding ontological hierarchy that places animal life on a level above other kinds.”
In Rich’s view, religion is at the core of misperceptions and negative associations that have blinded people to fungi’s true nature and capacity. Mushrooms are “increasingly associated with the immorals [sic] of poverty, female sexuality, witchery, and otherworldly hallucinations… Perhaps it was fear and revulsion of the erotic explosions from the earth … [that] unjustly cast mushrooms so far down the hierarchy of existence, deep into heretical realms.”
Rich states that fungi have personalities and possess the capacity for learning, memory, cognition. No observations, research, or even antidotes are offered to support these claims. It is an unfortunate missed opportunity that neither the author nor editors considered that readers would be delighted to see examples of how a mushroom might exhibit behavior that can be viewed as greedy or grouchy or altruistic. Speculative philosophy, if that’s what this book is, does not bother with such things as evidence. It foregoes empiricism and the foundational scientific method. It relies on intuition and, oddly, insights into the nature of the Absolute or Divine.
This book series is intended for both academic and everyday readers, including book clubs. But I wonder if anyone beyond a niche segment of academia and those who seek fabulation or fantasy fiction will be interested in this work. There is a market for it, but the marketing literature is not helping put this book into the right hands, which is unfortunate for Rich. Assuming this is written in her preferred style, then she has done a fine job and this book should be steered to those who will appreciate it. I am not one of them.
Without the anchoring familiarity of having read past books in this series, there is no framework with which to judge how this book fits within it. It is filled with notional claims presented as fact and written with the zeal and passion of a disciple, but of what? Myco-theology, mushroom metaphysics. The hint as to what this means will not help us understand the relationship between religion and mushrooms, or their history, nature, abilities, and specialness, but it will help us understand Sara Rich—
“For a myco-theologian, sacrifice is slitting the throat of excess and eviscerating toxic waste. Sacrifice is letting go of consumer impulses and the asinine optimism of capitalism. Sacrifice is doing the hard work yourself without expecting others, whether blue collar or indigo milk cap, to follow behind and clean up after your mess. No blood, no martyrs; no slaves, no masters.”
I do hope this new theology will help her find a home in this universe. For now, she has the following to say:
“I am something of a shameless misanthrope, a self-loathing human in the new geological era of our own making, the Misanthropocene. My pessimism needs a cure.”
Many thanks to NetGalley for providing this ARC.
January 16, 2023
Read via NetGalley.
I've read a lot of these Object Lessons now, and they rarely disappoint. Intriguingly, Mushroom is perhaps the most surprisingly metaphorical of these so far. It's certainly not quite what I expected. There are short sections about specific mushrooms, related to (northern hemisphere) seasons. But the main sections are Mystery, Metaphor, Mycology, Medicine and Magic. All of these things I know relate to mushrooms and the history of their use by humans; there was a bit more emphasis on the metaphor aspect overall than I had anticipated. Which was certainly interesting, just not what I imagined!
Mushrooms are eaten for sustenance, of course, but they have also been used for medical and spiritual and magical purposes. Rich explores all of these, and - as most of these books do - also situates the discussion very personally.
Not quite what I expected, but not something I regret reading.
I've read a lot of these Object Lessons now, and they rarely disappoint. Intriguingly, Mushroom is perhaps the most surprisingly metaphorical of these so far. It's certainly not quite what I expected. There are short sections about specific mushrooms, related to (northern hemisphere) seasons. But the main sections are Mystery, Metaphor, Mycology, Medicine and Magic. All of these things I know relate to mushrooms and the history of their use by humans; there was a bit more emphasis on the metaphor aspect overall than I had anticipated. Which was certainly interesting, just not what I imagined!
Mushrooms are eaten for sustenance, of course, but they have also been used for medical and spiritual and magical purposes. Rich explores all of these, and - as most of these books do - also situates the discussion very personally.
Not quite what I expected, but not something I regret reading.
February 28, 2023
Mushroom, by Sara Rich, offers a wide-ranging look at mushrooms, from foraging and identifying to how they have been viewed and used throughout history. This is all accomplished with a personal perspective and some anecdotal stories.
This is part of the Object Lessons series and, since there seems to be confusion about what this series is, I want to start there. Even some readers who get enjoyment out of criticizing (not critiquing, a big difference) the series insist on reading the books. These are not simply a history or etymology or even a story about how something is made. They usually include elements of these things, but we also read about how the objects have been perceived over time, how they have perhaps been appropriated for symbols of ideas both positive and negative. And, what makes this particularly appealing for many, is the personal element, the way we see the object through the writer's eyes as well as the frames within which they're presented.
In this volume we learn a lot about both the mushroom itself as well as a fascinating history and a philosophical approach. Here's the thing: you don't have to buy in to the opinions and ideas in order to both enjoy and gain insight from the book. I was personally more interested in the history, particularly how they were often perceived as representing things they didn't. Although I didn't find myself going along with Rich's formulation of a guiding belief system, I did find a lot of the ideas useful to consider. Admittedly I don't automatically misuse the term "woke" when I am not in complete agreement with someone, much like some people of limited mental capacity.
If you enjoy learning about an object in many of its forms and uses, you will enjoy this book and gain a new perspective. If you didn't read the book description and expect either a dry history, a field guide, or even a cookbook, this may not be for you. If you get your enjoyment from misusing words like "woke" for anything that looks at objects in a more holistic manner, you will enjoy being able to pretend to be smart by making asinine criticisms of this. And you'll give others the chance to laugh at your ignorance (thanks thee!).
Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.
This is part of the Object Lessons series and, since there seems to be confusion about what this series is, I want to start there. Even some readers who get enjoyment out of criticizing (not critiquing, a big difference) the series insist on reading the books. These are not simply a history or etymology or even a story about how something is made. They usually include elements of these things, but we also read about how the objects have been perceived over time, how they have perhaps been appropriated for symbols of ideas both positive and negative. And, what makes this particularly appealing for many, is the personal element, the way we see the object through the writer's eyes as well as the frames within which they're presented.
In this volume we learn a lot about both the mushroom itself as well as a fascinating history and a philosophical approach. Here's the thing: you don't have to buy in to the opinions and ideas in order to both enjoy and gain insight from the book. I was personally more interested in the history, particularly how they were often perceived as representing things they didn't. Although I didn't find myself going along with Rich's formulation of a guiding belief system, I did find a lot of the ideas useful to consider. Admittedly I don't automatically misuse the term "woke" when I am not in complete agreement with someone, much like some people of limited mental capacity.
If you enjoy learning about an object in many of its forms and uses, you will enjoy this book and gain a new perspective. If you didn't read the book description and expect either a dry history, a field guide, or even a cookbook, this may not be for you. If you get your enjoyment from misusing words like "woke" for anything that looks at objects in a more holistic manner, you will enjoy being able to pretend to be smart by making asinine criticisms of this. And you'll give others the chance to laugh at your ignorance (thanks thee!).
Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via NetGalley.
January 4, 2023
Mushroom is a philosophical foray into fungi symbolism with author Sara Rich, part of the Object Lessons series. She uses religion, tradition, culture, magic and mythology to describe various aspects and describes fungi with human traits. As a rabid mushroom forager and fungi identifier I am consumed with finding the correct habitat and growing conditions It is important to focus on weather and symbiotic relationships with certain trees. As the author says, mushrooms are nouns and verbs and this is evident on each foray. Each is beautiful and miraculous. My beliefs and thoughts differ often with the author's through the book but there is always something to learn from reading and reflection. Though fungi are incredible, I do not see them as having human traits. They are, however, symbolic and have been since for thousands of years.
The author writes essays within each season and describes fungi for each essay or lesson such as regeneration and renewal. She includes anecdotes. One which stands out in my mind is that if an insect likes a mushroom, humans will, too. But, of course, readers need to read contextually and carefully as that is far from the truth. One of my favourite expressions about foraging is "Every mushroom is edible. Some only once." But the focus is less on fungi than our relationships with it and reliance upon it.
Whilst the book is about mushrooms in an umbrella way, this book is not necessarily I would recommend to all foragers. At least not to those who simply love to be immersed in nature surrounded by wonders. It is for those who philosophize and dig deeper into other realms. Though not for me, it did cause me to reflect.
My sincere thank you to Bloomsbury Academic and NetGalley for the providing me with an early digital copy of this interesting book.
The author writes essays within each season and describes fungi for each essay or lesson such as regeneration and renewal. She includes anecdotes. One which stands out in my mind is that if an insect likes a mushroom, humans will, too. But, of course, readers need to read contextually and carefully as that is far from the truth. One of my favourite expressions about foraging is "Every mushroom is edible. Some only once." But the focus is less on fungi than our relationships with it and reliance upon it.
Whilst the book is about mushrooms in an umbrella way, this book is not necessarily I would recommend to all foragers. At least not to those who simply love to be immersed in nature surrounded by wonders. It is for those who philosophize and dig deeper into other realms. Though not for me, it did cause me to reflect.
My sincere thank you to Bloomsbury Academic and NetGalley for the providing me with an early digital copy of this interesting book.
January 12, 2023
Sara Rich's Mushroom joins the Object Lesson series for an exploration of fungi in their various incarnations both in the natural world and their metaphorical or mystical uses.
In its organization Rich set out to make sure it had a "structured rhythm, not unlike walking... with regularly paced chapters..." (pg 119), and it does live up to this goal. It is divided into six parts, each with their own subsections. Each of those six parts ends with descriptions of a particular mushroom that is harvested in a season, along with how to identify it, its taste and how to cook and store it.
Topic wise, Mushroom discusses the concept of myco-theology, a blending of the environmental or botanical histories, development and functions of the mushroom with a theological beliefs tied to a mushrooms functioning. As mushrooms have survived past extinction events, can they point us to a more sustainable future? If life still exists on earth it is most likely to be fungi.
It gets a bit messy. Aside from this focus, the reader learns a great bit about foraging, where to look for particular mushrooms and dining possibilities. Rich also makes some interesting diversions into more cultural themes such as the mushroom as representative of a phallus or sexuality to the traditional imagery of the Christmas decorations as well as some of the medicinal and recreational usage of mushrooms and some of the compounds in them.
Full of lots of interesting ideas and discussions, for me Mushroom unfortunately doesn't quite cohere into a full work. Much feels left unclear below the surface.
I received a free digital version of this book via NetGalley thanks to the publisher.
In its organization Rich set out to make sure it had a "structured rhythm, not unlike walking... with regularly paced chapters..." (pg 119), and it does live up to this goal. It is divided into six parts, each with their own subsections. Each of those six parts ends with descriptions of a particular mushroom that is harvested in a season, along with how to identify it, its taste and how to cook and store it.
Topic wise, Mushroom discusses the concept of myco-theology, a blending of the environmental or botanical histories, development and functions of the mushroom with a theological beliefs tied to a mushrooms functioning. As mushrooms have survived past extinction events, can they point us to a more sustainable future? If life still exists on earth it is most likely to be fungi.
It gets a bit messy. Aside from this focus, the reader learns a great bit about foraging, where to look for particular mushrooms and dining possibilities. Rich also makes some interesting diversions into more cultural themes such as the mushroom as representative of a phallus or sexuality to the traditional imagery of the Christmas decorations as well as some of the medicinal and recreational usage of mushrooms and some of the compounds in them.
Full of lots of interesting ideas and discussions, for me Mushroom unfortunately doesn't quite cohere into a full work. Much feels left unclear below the surface.
I received a free digital version of this book via NetGalley thanks to the publisher.
February 3, 2023
So I’ve had mixed results with the Object Lessons series, short books that focus on the hidden history of everyday objects. My introduction was to “Sewer”, a fascinating look at the world beneath our feet. I followed that up with “Burger”, basically an essay against advertising, meat, consumerism – pretty much anti-burger and not at all to my liking. Next came “Blue Jeans”, another great entry about an everyday item that has come to mean so much in this world, easily the best in the series so far.
Which brings us to “Mushroom” by Sara Rich. The pattern seems to say that this will not be one of my favorites, and in this case the pattern is correct. When Ms. Rich writes about mushrooms and their uses (which is only four pages or so in the entire book) it is interesting and right on topic. I also enjoyed her stories about mushroom picking, and how mushrooms have played a role in her life. But unfortunately most of the book dives into mysticism, surrealism, symbolism, philosophy, theology, and many, many more things that I did not understand nor at times really saw how this dealt with mushrooms. Aristotle makes an appearance, along with witches and the claims that mushrooms are (basically) sentient beings.
Too much meandering, too much philosophical musings, too much pseudoscience. It seems that in this series, I enjoy the books that are actually about the subject they are supposed to explain. “Mushroom” stretches that connection. Not for me.
I requested and received a free advanced electronic copy from Bloomsbury Academic via NetGalley. Thank you!
Which brings us to “Mushroom” by Sara Rich. The pattern seems to say that this will not be one of my favorites, and in this case the pattern is correct. When Ms. Rich writes about mushrooms and their uses (which is only four pages or so in the entire book) it is interesting and right on topic. I also enjoyed her stories about mushroom picking, and how mushrooms have played a role in her life. But unfortunately most of the book dives into mysticism, surrealism, symbolism, philosophy, theology, and many, many more things that I did not understand nor at times really saw how this dealt with mushrooms. Aristotle makes an appearance, along with witches and the claims that mushrooms are (basically) sentient beings.
Too much meandering, too much philosophical musings, too much pseudoscience. It seems that in this series, I enjoy the books that are actually about the subject they are supposed to explain. “Mushroom” stretches that connection. Not for me.
I requested and received a free advanced electronic copy from Bloomsbury Academic via NetGalley. Thank you!
February 19, 2023
People like me come to this series for the chance to be reading – if only for a couple of hours – about something they've never read before. They don't come for the ultra-left, none-more-woke pronoun-mangling, and generally they don't care for the autobiography. Here, right from the kick-off, we get all three – but rest assured, the pronoun talk is for a reason, the autobiography lightly and well used, and we begin right up the enjoyment scale with surprisingly engaging content.
First off we're looking at historical thoughts about fungi – how they may seem the lowest of the low in some orderings, but may have been vital to certain religions (here the author claiming more knowledge of Mithraism than some Mithraic temple ruins I've been to are willing to declare we know about), and their appearance out of little surely must have been eye-opening to alchemists.
Unfortunately I found too little to carry on from there – the book being very much in honour of its subject, yet in ways I never presumed it might be. In getting to be so much about what the polymath creator calls "mushroom metaphysics" I was not in the hands of a botanist, or nutritionist, and the foraging expert had been waylaid somewhere. No, I was in a head shop.
Here is the hair shirt worn in apology for mankind's inhumanity, and the hope that respect for the fungi and so on might be remembered from ancient religions and philosophies, in order that capitalism and eco-ignorance be a bit less of an evil, etc etc and so on. Like I say, on topic, but not in ways I sought.
First off we're looking at historical thoughts about fungi – how they may seem the lowest of the low in some orderings, but may have been vital to certain religions (here the author claiming more knowledge of Mithraism than some Mithraic temple ruins I've been to are willing to declare we know about), and their appearance out of little surely must have been eye-opening to alchemists.
Unfortunately I found too little to carry on from there – the book being very much in honour of its subject, yet in ways I never presumed it might be. In getting to be so much about what the polymath creator calls "mushroom metaphysics" I was not in the hands of a botanist, or nutritionist, and the foraging expert had been waylaid somewhere. No, I was in a head shop.
Here is the hair shirt worn in apology for mankind's inhumanity, and the hope that respect for the fungi and so on might be remembered from ancient religions and philosophies, in order that capitalism and eco-ignorance be a bit less of an evil, etc etc and so on. Like I say, on topic, but not in ways I sought.
January 7, 2023
Picking a book from the Object Lessons series is like foraging (which is one of the themes of this book): you never know what you will find. It can be a memoir, a popular science book or a personal essay. ‘Mushroom’ falls mainly into the essay category, as it is widely eclectic and dives into many different topics. There is a bit of ecology, English literature and alchemy; the author brings stories from the past as well as looks into the future. She is mostly focused on the relationship between humans and fungi, rather than on biology. It can be sometimes a little bit meandering but brings many inspiring ideas as well.
The book is a part of an interesting series, Object Lessons, about the hidden lives of ordinary things.
Thanks to the publisher, Bloomsbury Academic, and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book.
The book is a part of an interesting series, Object Lessons, about the hidden lives of ordinary things.
Thanks to the publisher, Bloomsbury Academic, and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book.
January 24, 2023
This book is a delight. If this title is anything to go on, I am now eager to learn more about others in the "Object Lessons" series. Each book discusses the hidden lives of an ordinary thing.
This is a deep dive into the mushroom, the physical object, the metaphorical object, the mystery, the magic and the mycology. The exploration is deep and wide. Rich is the kind of gifted writer and scholar that I would love to read on any subject. What an intellectual playground she creates. Mushrooms are looked at from every angle, and topics range from foraging to philosophy, from alchemy to capitalism, from metaphor to witchcraft, from psilocybin to fly agaric. It was a wild ride, and I was utterly transfixed. Highly recommend.
My thanks to the Bloomsbury and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an ARC.
This is a deep dive into the mushroom, the physical object, the metaphorical object, the mystery, the magic and the mycology. The exploration is deep and wide. Rich is the kind of gifted writer and scholar that I would love to read on any subject. What an intellectual playground she creates. Mushrooms are looked at from every angle, and topics range from foraging to philosophy, from alchemy to capitalism, from metaphor to witchcraft, from psilocybin to fly agaric. It was a wild ride, and I was utterly transfixed. Highly recommend.
My thanks to the Bloomsbury and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an ARC.
February 25, 2025
"Mushroom" by Sarah Rich is part of the great Object Lessons series by Bloomsbury featuring essays about everyday objects.
The book’s essay is divided by seasons beginning with Fall and returning again. Each season begins with a featured mushroom, like Chicken-of-the-woods and where it can be found as well as edible versus toxic. Along the way, many aspects of fungi are discussed like medicinal, culinary and religious. The book includes scientific notes, anecdotes and expanding one’s consciousness.
Told in a concise manner, this book still traverses quite a lot in its short page length. I found the writing conversational and the topic informative. I’ve always been fascinated by mushrooms and I can tell this author is as well.
The book’s essay is divided by seasons beginning with Fall and returning again. Each season begins with a featured mushroom, like Chicken-of-the-woods and where it can be found as well as edible versus toxic. Along the way, many aspects of fungi are discussed like medicinal, culinary and religious. The book includes scientific notes, anecdotes and expanding one’s consciousness.
Told in a concise manner, this book still traverses quite a lot in its short page length. I found the writing conversational and the topic informative. I’ve always been fascinated by mushrooms and I can tell this author is as well.
January 10, 2023
I chose this short book on mushrooms because I've had a long-standing interest in fungi since my microbiology degree. I read Merlin Sheldrake's book Entangled Life last year and thoroughly enjoyed it.
Mushroom by Sara Rich is a more individual exploration of what fungi mean to us, looking at spiritual, culinary, environmental, psychedelic and metaphysical aspects. There were some interesting concepts in the book, but I found much of the text overly sesquipedalian which meant I had to re-read some sections to fully appreciate the meaning. Nevertheless, I can recommend the book for everyone who has even a passing interest in mushrooms.
Mushroom by Sara Rich is a more individual exploration of what fungi mean to us, looking at spiritual, culinary, environmental, psychedelic and metaphysical aspects. There were some interesting concepts in the book, but I found much of the text overly sesquipedalian which meant I had to re-read some sections to fully appreciate the meaning. Nevertheless, I can recommend the book for everyone who has even a passing interest in mushrooms.
January 16, 2023
I love this series. This book is where mycology, history, esotericism, literary criticism, and sociological discourse meet into one intriguing experience. It is set up a logical fashion with each season followed by the most abundant mushroom species of that particular season. From there, the thread departs into a variety of subjects that left my mind whirling. I was expecting this to have been more focused on individual mushrooms and their context in history and culture. This book was so much more. There some weird tangents that I didn’t jive with, but other than that, it fit in with the series very well.
Thank you, NetGalley!
Thank you, NetGalley!
January 19, 2023
This book is an interesting venture into the world of mushrooms, their secrets and how these organisms fit into our lives and the world we live in. I enjoyed reading this mixture of memoirs, mushroom descriptions and stories, interlaced with frequent ventures into history and philosophy, which albeit intriguing felt a bit too distant from the subject matter at times.
Nevertheless, this book is a good read, providing plenty of learning about the intriguing life of plants, mushrooms and beyond, while tying it all into the writer's personal history and a broader critique of the capitalist system.
Nevertheless, this book is a good read, providing plenty of learning about the intriguing life of plants, mushrooms and beyond, while tying it all into the writer's personal history and a broader critique of the capitalist system.
February 18, 2023
Various reviewers have used words like trippy and academic when describing this book and those are words I’d use. It is definitely both of those.
I love mushrooms— foraging them, photographing them, learning about them, spore printing them…. But I guess I just don’t love reading philosophical ramblings about them.
I found this book excruciatingly boring, I’m sorry to say. It made me feel stupid reading it, as if I weren’t intellectual enough to get it. I’m sure it will be a marvelous fit for some readers but you might want to peek inside first and see if it’s a good fit for you.
I read a temporary digital copy of this book via NetGalley.
I love mushrooms— foraging them, photographing them, learning about them, spore printing them…. But I guess I just don’t love reading philosophical ramblings about them.
I found this book excruciatingly boring, I’m sorry to say. It made me feel stupid reading it, as if I weren’t intellectual enough to get it. I’m sure it will be a marvelous fit for some readers but you might want to peek inside first and see if it’s a good fit for you.
I read a temporary digital copy of this book via NetGalley.
June 1, 2023
This wasn’t one of my favourites in the generally wonderful Object Lessons series, but one’s response to these books is always personal. I found this one too meandering, even too abstruse at times, with some sentences being quite impenetrable. Too disjointed, and I would have preferred a tighter structure. For me there was an overdose of memoir and personal anecdote, and too many metaphorical passages. However, that said, it’s still an informative and often thought-provoking exploration of mushrooms in all their various manifestations, wide-ranging and comprehensive in its approach, and I learnt a lot.
January 13, 2023
Mushroom is an interesting foray into mushrooms, philosophy, religion, and the human condition. Told over six chapters, Sarah Rich reviews the uses and history of a number of mushrooms while also exploring their cultural and philosophical properties. The writing style is very rhythmic and easy to read. Mushroom was very informative and got me thinking about the world around me and how everything ties together in ways that I don't usually take the time to think about.
March 30, 2023
Part memoir, part history and science lessons, with a touch of the theological and philosophical thrown in there, Mushroom is a tasty mycological treat that will enthrall any fungal fans. I truly enjoyed the read!
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the Advance copy, all opinions are my own!
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the Advance copy, all opinions are my own!
May 29, 2024
I wanted to love this book. I really did. However, I found the writing to be pompous and masturbatory. As for the subject matter, for a book called “mushroom”, it doesn’t actually talk much about mushrooms. The author spends much more time talking about herself. In the end, I was very disappointed by this book.
January 23, 2023
First read of 2023, it was delivered on my birthday, and on one of my favorite subjects. Who could ask for more?
Sara Rich created a wonderful piece of work. It was introspective and informative. I cannot wait to share this and re-read this.
What a start to the year!
Sara Rich created a wonderful piece of work. It was introspective and informative. I cannot wait to share this and re-read this.
What a start to the year!
March 7, 2023
This was a really fascinating book. Like all Object Lessons, this is part memoir, part cultural exploration of an object, in this case, a Mushroom, that we see all around us. I enjoyed reading this and think the author's writing style was well-suited to this subject. 4.5 Stars
November 11, 2024
Ok. Nothing to write home about. It wasn’t very engaging, but did provide a bit of information about mushrooms that I didn’t already know. (Though due to lack of engagement (or bad memory) I don’t recall these facts now!). The book felt rather disjointed overall.
June 1, 2023
This is a book series I hadn't heard about until I requested this, because I always like learning more about mushrooms. This is one series I'm going to look for more of, and definitely an author I'll be paying attention to in the future. This is a quick little essay of a book, blending folk remedies, cooking instructions for safe foraging, the weirdness of the biology of mushrooms, and a review of selected literature around them. Read through this in an afternoon off, and enjoyed it. Definitely worth your time, especially if you like mushrooms.
February 8, 2023
Thank you Netgalley for an advanced copy!
A trippy, lyrical non-fiction book that is part memoir and part science textbook about mushrooms. There is a lot of science on mushrooms, but also the long, strange journey that humans and mushrooms have been on together for thousands of years.
A trippy, lyrical non-fiction book that is part memoir and part science textbook about mushrooms. There is a lot of science on mushrooms, but also the long, strange journey that humans and mushrooms have been on together for thousands of years.
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