The Weeds

by Katy Simpson Smith

Two women, connected across time, edge toward transgression in pursuit of their desires.

A Mississippi woman pushes through the ruin of the Roman Colosseum, searching for plants. She has escaped her life, apprenticed herself to catalog all the species growing in this place. Crawling along the stones, she wonders how she has landed here, a reluctant botanist amid a snarl of tourists in comfortable sandals. She hunts for a scientific agenda and a direction of her own.

In 1855, a woman pushes through the jungle of the Roman Colosseum, searching for plants. As punishment for her misbehavior, she has been indentured to the English botanist Richard Deakin, for whom she will compile a flora. She is a thief, and she must find new ways to use her hands. If only the woman she loves weren’t on a boat, with a husband. But love isn’t always possible. She logs 420 species.

Through a list of seemingly minor plants and their uses—medical, agricultural, culinary—these women calculate intangible threats: a changing climate, the cost of knowledge, and the ways repeated violence can upend women’s lives. They must forge their own small acts of defiance and slip through whatever cracks they find. How can anyone survive?

Lush, intoxicating, and teeming with mischief, Katy Simpson Smith’s The Weeds is a tense, mesmerizing page-turner about science and survival, the roles women are given and have taken from them, and the lives they make for themselves.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Nature, LGBT, Literary Fiction, Queer, Historical

320 pages, Hardcover

First published April 18, 2023

About the author

Katy Simpson Smith attended Mount Holyoke College and received a PhD in history from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars. She has been working as an Adjunct Professor at Tulane University and is the author of We Have Raised All of You: Motherhood in the South, 1750-1835. Her debut novel, The Story of Land and Sea, was published by Harper in August 2014. She lives in New Orleans.

Reviews

[Melissa ~ Bantering Books · Rating 4 out of 5]

Katy Simpson Smith’s The Weeds is a headful of a book. It challenged me, confused me, frustrated me, and, in many ways, inspired me. And it worked my brain – HARD.

We have two unnamed women, one in 1855 and one in the present, searching for plants at the Roman Colosseum. One is there as a punishment for past crimes, and the other is unsure of how she even landed there. Through their voices, not only do we learn of a multitude of flora, but we confront a number of relevant topics – the historical and modern-day oppression of women, science vs. emotion, and climate change.

The Weeds is as literary as literary fiction can be. Smith’s writing is both beautiful and intellectual, clear in places and abstract in others. The two narrators' perspectives are often indistinct, albeit intentionally so, and it’s difficult to know whose head you’re immersed in. Plus, each chapter and each section break begins with a brief but scientific description of a plant, which, after 300 pages of it, is tedious to read.

And Smith loves her metaphors. Some are subtle, some are over my head, and some are glaring – yet all (of the ones I understand) are spot on. The most obvious being that women, even in this day and age, are seen by some men as nothing more than weeds: annoying, worthless, and always in the way.

Though I enjoyed it, I’m uncertain as to whether The Weeds is a read for the masses. It’s a lot to consume and process. But those who do pick it up will find it rewarding if they embrace the challenge.

I, for one, am so glad I read it. And it wouldn’t surprise me if I later discover it’s one of my favorite books of 2023.


My sincerest appreciation to Katy Simpson Smith, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, and NetGalley for the digital review copy. All opinions included herein are my own.

This was another thought-provoking buddy read with my fabulous GR friend, Melissa Crytzer Fry. Be sure to check out her review – it’s better than mine.

[Ari Levine · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5, rounded down. This is a much more subversive and experimental novel than the alternating historical and contemporary narratives that the staid jacket copy would suggest. Simpson Smith combines two first-person narrators, both of whom are nameless and distinguishable only through internal clues (no obvious flagging of PoVs as in, say, Lincoln in the Bardo).

In 1850s Rome, a young Italian woman (a thief whose father is punishing her for having a lesbian relationship) is assisting the patronizing English naturalist Richard Deakin in cataloguing the flora growing in the Colosseum. In our own time, a young graduate student from Mississippi (still processing the long-ago death of her mother) is doing the hard work of re-cataloguing them (and the effects of climate change) for her lazy and mansplaining graduate advisor. Both of them are subject to, rebel against, and reluctantly consent to, patriarchal domination in dramatic and subtle ways. Simpson Smith weaves these stories in counterpoint, so that they illuminate each other: weeds as metaphors for feminist survival.

What made this novel overwrought and over-engineered is its central narrative conceit: The Weeds is comprised of botanical journal entries written by one or the other of these unnamed narrators, and follows the Linnean taxonomy of Deakin's entries for 420 different species. Each short entry, only about a page long sometimes riffs lyrically or metaphorically on the name or function or appearance of a specific bush or tree or grass. And sometimes slow-walks the narrative along with minimal haste, as diaries of their interactions with hideous men: a father, a hookup/boyfriend, a fiancé, Deakin, the advisor. Rather than forging an emotive or empathetic connection between reader and character, this extravagant cleverness created a vast ironic distance, and an unnecessarily choppy narrative that was too easy to put down.

Thanks to Netgalley and FSG for giving me an ARC of this in return for an honest, unbiased review.

[grace · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. I think it’s well-researched, clever, and timely. It also happens to be one of my favorite niche genres (fiction about contemporary and historical women botanists)!

One of my favorite things about the book is the structure. The book is a series of short vignettes from two (three, actually) points of view. It is organized to mirror Deakin’s Flora of the Colosseum of Rome (1855), which is the book that unites the two main characters across time. Each chapter corresponds with a family of plants found in the Colosseum, and each vignette/section corresponds with a type of plant in that family. The nineteenth century character’s vignettes are written as letters to her lost lover, while the contemporary character’s vignettes are more like journal entries. I love how the two main characters’ stories were intertwined with plants—the connection to plants added surprising, and often poetic, insights to the narrative and characters. I think it was really well done (it also reminded me of the botany classes I took in undergrad!).

At first it was a little difficult to tell the narrators apart, but it was not a problem once I learned to differentiate between the modern voice and the historical voice. The contemporary character was clearly cognizant of and concerned about climate change, which I appreciated.

I think fans of The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert and Barbara Kingsolver novels will enjoy this book. I also think fans of Circe by Madeline Miller will enjoy it as well—although The Weeds lacks mythical elements, it is similar to Circe in that it is about women wielding power through plants.

Thanks to NetGalley and FSG for the ARC!

[nicole · Rating 3 out of 5]

hope to never see the word f-ing written on a page ever again

[David Dunlap · Rating 1 out of 5]

OK, I realize this: the traditional fiction narrative is DEAD. Gone are the days when one could open a book and begin reading at the beginning of the story...and continue until, in the last pages, one reaches the end of the tale being spun. I suppose authors need to (or want to?) find different ways to make their names by shuffling things about in various ways. There are books that drop the reader into the middle of an action, which is then explained backwards as the plot moves forward. There are books riddled with flashbacks from previous times in the characters' lives. And, especially more recently, there are the two narratives, sometimes centuries apart, that come together -- and somehow intertwine -- at the end. 'The Weeds,' however, does something I've not previously encountered: two plot lines, a century apart, that are unfolding simultaneously. One of the two female protagonists is a thief in mid-1800 Italy, sentenced to do grunt work for an English botanist by investigating and cataloging all the flora to be found in the ruins of the Roman Coliseum, while pining for her lover (now married and off on a voyage with her new husband); the other protagonist, in our times, is working for her graduate degree under the supervision of a rather unsympathetic academic advisor, while investigating and cataloging all the flora to be found in the ruins of the Roman Coliseum, checking against the work of the 19th Century English botanist. One paragraph may be from the perspective of our thief, the next from that of the grad student. I found it all a bit disorienting...and stopped reading at page 104. Not my cuppa...though it might be -yours.- -- One thing I did enjoy: encountering the various plants themselves, described in some detail, including their use in folk medicine. (I rather wish the book had been more lavishly illustrated, so that one could see the plants and flowers being described.)

[AJ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Absolutely no reason for it to be as long as it is, and can often be very meandering—but there are moments of brilliance!

[Jeanette]

No rating. DNF Just can't abide in the stilted poetic effusive style. Not the order, nor the connecting context either. You may choose to dig it out. Ugh!

[Hudson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Let the poor woman say fuck

[johnny ♡ · Rating 3 out of 5]

“the weeds” is the story of two women 150 years apart studying the flora of the roman colosseum. beautifully written in prose that borders on poetry, it is masterful. we learn about many forms of plant life as well as their uses and how they relate to these women’s lives and experiences.

the fact that there are two points of view is very hard to wrap your head around. it wasn’t always clear who we were following or what exactly was happening. it’s a bit too abstract, but very beautiful. the illustrations of plant life were wonderful and added to the experience. however, it was a bit difficult to follow.

thank you to netgalley and the publisher for an arc in exchange for an honest review!

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very, very good. I do wonder, though, how the second woman would build a flora on a Coliseum that is roofed? ;-) Some people says it's hard to read, but they should try some of KSS's other books. I found it highly readable even though I'm almost completely plant illiterate. I really enjoyed the first-person narration with both characters.

[Kate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Women and weeds. Women as weeds. Poetic, subversive, tense, overwrought - a surprise page turner.

[Tessy Consentino · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really cool concept for a story.

[Erica Newcomb · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm only giving this an extra star because a lesbian kills a creepy man.

Overall, I couldn't enjoy this book because of the format it was written. I get the whole botanical journal thing, but it made the stories very disjointed but also repetitive? Like you don't really know what's going on until the very end and not in a satisfying way.

I had secondhand embarrassment for the present day character. I feel bad for hating on her because she's literally a victim, but she's so cringe and kind of insufferable.

The illustrations in the book are beautiful I'll give it that.

[Sierra Klawitter · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 🌟

[Jill · Rating 4 out of 5]

Collated botany journals, cataloguing the Coliseum.
A woman now, aspiring botanist, dead mother, so much rage, trying to get herself going.
A woman in 1854, a foiled lesbian, aspiring botanist, bride effectively for sale, existentially crisising.

This book won’t be for everyone. But I loved it.

[Sabrina · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Feelings," he says, smug. "This is the problem with my female assistants - excuse the phrase."
...
"Wait," I say, horrified at my own horror at being called a woman.
...
By feelings he means sex; by feelings I mean anger.

[Edes · Rating 1 out of 5]

I apparently am alone in not "loving" this book. I only managed to get through the first chapter and was frustrated by the tangled and dramatic prose.

My son once told me, about a book he read, "it gets better after the first 100 pages." Since I read for enjoyment, slogging through a book in the hope that it gets better isn't for me. I couldn't get a grasp on the character and couldn't figure out which time period she was in. And I assume the plant descriptions were supposed to relate to the paragraph content?

I sometimes feel that a book gets over hyped because it is different. Sadly, I usually am disappointed because it turns out to just be overly pretentious. I can't recommend this book.

[K.M. · Rating 1 out of 5]

I found this book to be unreadable.

[Natalie D.C. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A haunting, tense exploration of two women's lives - one living in 2018 working under a jackass advisor cataloguing plants in Rome's Colosseum ruins and the other living in 1854 mourning the loss of her lover as she prepares for an unwanting marriage - that uses plants for an allegory for all that women across generations have loved and lost. The premise and cover are alluring and the story is even more so, its lovely prose and fascinating facts about plants interspersed between the characters' own tragic lives sweeping the reader under a dark spell. While I wish there were markers that noted which passage was in which women's perspective (it took me until halfway through to actually get comfortable with the POV switches) and while I didn't care for the "ghost" POV sprinkled throughout (his POV literally didn't have any substance until the very end), I still really enjoyed this narrative and appreciate what it's trying to do and say. I'll definitely check out Smith's other works as this was certainly a wonder of a read.

[Olivia · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Weeds challenged me in a surprising way. I didn’t realize the book switches point of views without announcement until I had already read an embarrassing amount, but it became easy to determine which character was narrating soon enough. The use of flowers and herbs as extensions of the narrators and their experiences was beautiful. I was reminded of analyzing passages in literature classes to get the most meaning out of a passage as possible, but doing this in The Weeds felt rewarding and unlike the chore of literature class analyses. I wanted to connect these plants with the narrators’ experiences and I thought it was written beautifully.

I’m looking forward to revisiting The Weeds in the future to learn how I might connect differently with our narrators and the weeds they catalogued.

[Geonn Cannon · Rating 3 out of 5]

A five-star story told in a three-star way. You know how when you're talking to someone, and she stops to take a breath, someone else starts telling you an unrelated, different story? And when that person takes a breath, the other person goes on with their story? And then back and forth and back and forth until finally you don't care about what's happening in either story because you have zero opportunity to get invested in a scene because it's just going to stop and change course in a second anyway?

That's my experience with this book.

[kari · Rating 2 out of 5]

this is an amazing book for a certain audience, and that audience isnt me

[Annie · Rating 4 out of 5]

The way I was taught history, in discrete segments that usually had big gaps between eras and places, means that it’s only now that I’m an adult that I’ve started to wonder about what I’ve missed. A few years ago, I read an amazing article by Paul M. Cooper (the brilliant creator and narrator of the Fall of Civilizations podcast) in The Atlantic (paywalled, unfortunately, but Open Culture has a brief overview) about what happened to the Colosseum after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Without the empire to continue to use it for its original purpose, it fell into disrepair. Romans took stones to build other things. Weather took care of a lot of the rest. Centuries later, natural philosophers, scientists, and botanists discovered that the ruin had become home to hundreds of species of plants, some of which weren’t native to the area and only managed to grow in Rome because of the Colosseum’s unique microclimates. Katy Simpson Smith’s virtuoso novel, The Weeds, brings us two botanists, in two different centuries, to the same place to explore questions about the nature of science, resilience, anger, and preservation...

Read the rest of my review at A Bookish Type.

[Jen G · Rating 2 out of 5]

The promise of this book sounded like just the type of nature-oriented literary fiction I love.

Unfortunately, I found most of the book (with some exceptions - there were a few great passages) painful. The word I keep seeing to describe this book is “overwrought” and that about sums it up.

Also, the author does not explain until the very end why the grad student always thinks the word “f-ing”, and the word then takes on significance and is justified, but for the first 3/4 of the book, it sounds very odd for a person to be thinking “f-ing” to themselves.

The grad student and her advisor were both horrible caricatures and I did not like either of them as people. The student was immature and unprofessional. The advisor was unsupportive and predatory.

I did enjoy the Latin plant names and their origins, and some of the storytelling from the past perspective.

[Grace · Rating 4 out of 5]

“The Weeds” is a poetic story of two women, separated by 150 years, cataloguing plants in the Colosseum. The story is told through entries in the lists of plants (and the thoughts of a ghost observing them). I did find it difficult to get into the story at first. It was hard to differentiate between the two narrators, and most entries are short, making the narrative a little choppy. However, as the story moved along, and parallels between the two narrators became clear, I got into the story more. The narrative style is inventive and the prose is beautiful; the author is skillful in weaving this strange, sad tale. It has the same vibes as “Lincoln in the Bardo”— experimental and bizarre but sweeps you along after you do some work to get into it. Overall, I quite enjoyed it and am glad I read it. I received an advance copy in exchange for this honest review.

[Stephanie Sterling · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very niche fiction about (white) female rage in academia (and other similar vocations) and plants. Chef's kiss. Probably 4.5 stars!

[Abby · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh my god??? I didn’t know what to expect of this but wow it was beautiful and so poetic and so heartbreaking as a woman in stem

[Lüdi · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm not entirely sure this book needed to be written

but also I guess it wasn't the worst thing I've ever read

[Hudson · Rating 2 out of 5]

did not like how the narrative flipped between timelines without notice made it very hard to read

[Elizabeth Boquet]

DNF. I like the concept but the execution wasn’t working for me.