Due to a sudden, unexpected passing in the family a few years ago and another more recently and my subsequent (mental) health issues stemming from that, I was unable to download this book in time to review it before it was archived as I did not visit this site for several years after the bereavements. This meant I didn't read or venture onto netgalley for years as not only did it remind me of that person as they shared my passion for reading, but I also struggled to maintain interest in anything due to overwhelming depression. I was therefore unable to download this title in time and so I couldn't give a review as it wasn't successfully acquired before it was archived. The second issue that has happened with some of my other books is that I had them downloaded to one particular device and said device is now defunct, so I have no access to those books anymore, sadly.

This means I can't leave an accurate reflection of my feelings towards the book as I am unable to read it now and so I am leaving a message of explanation instead. I am now back to reading and reviewing full time as once considerable time had passed I have found that books have been helping me significantly in terms of my mindset and mental health - this was after having no interest in anything for quite a number of years after the passings. Anything requested and approved will be read and a review written and posted to Amazon (where I am a Hall of Famer & Top Reviewer), Goodreads (where I have several thousand friends and the same amount who follow my reviews) and Waterstones (or Barnes & Noble if the publisher is American based). Thank you for the opportunity and apologies for the inconvenience.

A beautifully-written, in-depth and sweeping novel of family, nature, landscape and time. Hugely thought-provoking and engaging throughout.

This is a book that appealed to me more in theory than in practise. Despite adoring the concept and the message it conveyed throughout, the snippets of differing perspectives felt too fleeting for attachments to form and ultimately resulted in a severing of empathy with them, if not with their objective.

I received the ARC of this novel from NetGalley. Thank you! My opinion is my own, and I'll probably buy a paper copy of this novel at some point.

I loved it. I cried more than once. I wish I could have read it while sitting in a forest, or at least a park, surrounded by the trees it talks about. My windows on one side look out on chestnut trees, so at least I had that.

There are elements of this novel's story and structure that don't quite come together in the end (and having a fictional Civilization-but-more was a little much and yet perhaps not enough?), but the importance of that pales to the beauty of the prose and the message about the importance of seeing our responsibilities for all living things, and the way in which the novel tells stories about people but at the same time, stories about trees, seeing them as worthy of respect and recognition. It's incredibly poignant and it made me want to have even the tiniest plot of land so I could plant trees.

I so so enjoyed The Overstory. It was completely magical to read. I'm in awe f this writer's imagination. What a talent! It's original, unique and am sure is destined to become a classic. Thanks!

In The Overstory by Richard Powers characters and their stories are united by their interactions with trees.

I have been reading this book for weeks. Usually when it takes me a long time to finish a book it is because I don't like it. In this case it was because it was such an intense and profound experience I had to keep stepping away to process it for a bit and then going back in. It's a sprawling beast of a book with a huge cast of characters and there is so much in this. The main characters, of course, are the trees that populate the book. I read this shortly after finishing Robert Macfarlane's Underland, and reading them like this meant that I understood a lot more about the tree sections than I would ordinarily, and I think I got a lot more out of it. The novel is complex, humane, devastating and immersive and its message is incredibly powerful. I think it might go on to be one of those iconic, important books that marks a change in both the literary and real life landscape. I hope so.

Richard Powers’ Overstory is a wonderful exploration in what means to write from the perspective of trees, but one of his greater achievements in this book, is, I think, the formation of identification and empathy in something that does not look like us, but something that we depend upon and will outlive us. And, unless they fall victim to human greed and global warming (which, sad to say, is quite possible), tress will be still here, growing in silence, giving food and medicine, comfort and pleasure, to children yet unborn.

You would think that I had learnt by now that when a novel is described as 'sweeping' it means 'very long'. So when my reading device cheerfully informed me it would take me 11 hours to read this book I was surprised, slightly intimidated but determined to carry on. I am glad I did - this is a book that makes you think about the world and where we are going.

The first part of the book reads more as a collection of short stories which made for easy and enjoyable reading. There were times when the plot was so tense I did not want to read on, sensing a tragedy or disaster was just around the corner.

There are a few characters who probably add some hidden depth to the text but to my simple tastes could have been edited out and hence make the book shorter. Perhaps by the end I was delirious but I am not totally sure I totally got it, for most of the characters there was a definitive wrap up but for some, again the ones that I felt could be cut, things got too disconnected and vague.

The fact that this has won a Pulitzer and was shortlisted for the Booker, would rather put into the shade any review I could give! I thought it was stunning, measured and reminiscent of the American naturalistic tradition. Beautifully descriptive, intuitive and so rooted in history, it was a wonderful reading experience.

This is the most inspiring, heartbreaking hopeless and yet hopeful book I have read that deals with what as a race we are doing to our planet. I love the interconnected stories echoing the need to consider ourselves and our planet as a whole, living thing that needs to be nurtured if it is not too late that we have destroyed it already.

There is a wide range of characters but you do connect and empathise with them t varying degrees. The structure of the book is very clever and so as a reader you get the feeling that it is a natural growth and connection that brings the protagonists together or that tells their parallel stories.

Reading the scope and the depth of the book made me want to get out and do something positive to help change the world, one person at a time.

Sweet book, not really a novel as it contains four stories about human relations with trees. The first story follows a young couple who plant 4 chestnut trees using nuts that they got on their first date and have taken from the city to their landstake. The trees grow and mature or fail and later are photographed during the changing seasons by the descendants of the original planters. It was all kind of interesting but not totally gripping. I'm surprised it has garnered such praise and hype, so I was a bit underwhelmed by it in consequence.

Richard Powers writes with ambition, passion and reverence on the world of trees, their ancient intelligence and their central place in the fragile ecosystem. This is a dense and epic work of environmental fiction, a picture of the state of our planet and how humanity has contributed to its degradation. Whilst the over riding central character of this are trees, he interweaves the stories of the lives of 9 disparate individuals, within a four part structure of Roots, Trunk, Crown and Seeds. The stories of the 9 people appear to be isolated but interlinked with their varying connections to trees and their growing contribution in their efforts to prevent the destruction of forests and woods. Power immerses us in the world of trees, so wondrous, coming at the theme from multiple perspectives, packed with elements of science and a dollop of magical realism.

This is not a perfect or an easy read, there are occasions when Powers just cannot help himself from over egging the narrative with his heavy handed need to hammer home the same points a little too assiduously. However, this powerful paean to the treasure that are trees and nature, highlights one of the most important issues in our contemporary world, the state of the planet that our younger and future generations are set to inherit. People have failed to see the wood for the trees, thereby underlining our inability to intuit the place of humans amidst the wider ecosystems of the Earth we rely on to live and survive. This is an elegaic, extraordinary, and emotive read, if faintly exasperating at times, a critically important novel for our times on the issues surrounding sustainability. Many thanks to Random House Vintage.

I think it's fair to say that when Richard Powers gets an idea, he runs with it. The Overstory is a novel about trees. Every other sentence mentions a tree. The main characters each have a signature tree. And most of them converge to protect trees. The structure of the book itself is designed to resemble a tree - each character has a backstory that is a root; the stories converge in the longest section - the trunk; the characters diverge again into the crown; and then in the smallest section they produce the seeds of a future world.

And my goodness the book is long and involved. Most of the eight roots stories (featuring nine characters since two of them share a root - figuratively and literally) are novellas in their own right. We have a retired war veteran; a student; an academic who works out that trees communicate; a computer games designer; an intellectual copyright lawyer; a conceptual artist; a young Chinese American; and a psychologist. It should be a job of work to remember who they all are, but they are so well delineated and re-introduced that it is seldom a problem. Occasionally a couple of the characters blur but for the most part, they are quite distinct.

And most of them play some role in defending America's ancient forest from the logging corporations. They take on the might of business, government, law enforcement agencies and a sceptical wider public. They call into question the wisdom of using non-renewable natural resources; on the one hand it seems churlish not to use the bounties that nature provides; but on the other hand what happens when they are gone? For all the examples through history that Richard Powers calls into play, the one he doesn't reference is Easter Island - the people who cut down all their trees to lever up giant statues, offering no future source of wood to build boats. It's all well and good to assume that something else will turn up, but what if it doesn't?

Where some of the stories intersect, a couple of them don't. The computer games designer and the lawyer seem to have parallel narratives that are engaging, but somehow tangential to the overall novel. And those tangential links come right at the end. It is odd, but it does offer some relief from what would otherwise be some pretty intense eco-warrior battle stories.

The stories are deeply hooking. The strength of the worlds that are created; the complexity of the characters is quite wonderful. There is an overall editorial narrative, but for the most part the eco-message is done through the characters and the story. Many books fall into the trap of telling, not showing. The Overstory shows.

For me, the full power of the novel came through by the end of the Trunk section. The pressure built and built; we reached a glorious and terrible crescendo. After that, the timelines started to stretch and it felt as though the pressure had been let off. That doesn't mean the story didn't continue to develop - it did - but some of the passion that had driven the characters in their eco-crusade had gone. At first this felt like a disappointment, an anti-climax. But a few days after finishing the novel, it feels like a real strength. It shows the ageing and the decay which, as the book illustrates with trees, is what nourishes other species and future generations.

I came to The Overstory with no great love of Richard Powers (I struggled through Orfeo); and no great sympathy for tree-huggers. I surprised myself by loving the novel; being persuaded by the message; and getting ever so emotionally attached to some of the characters. The Booker Prize has its critics, but if it can get me to read novels of this quality - against my natural instincts - then it is a wonderful thing.

A slow, demanding, amazing, and meditative book that will make you think.
I love the style of writing, powerful and brilliant, and the author develops strong and powerful characters.
And I love when he talks about trees in a poetic and informative way.
This book is full of food for thought, it will make you wonder and there is no easy answer to the questions.
There's no happy ending and it's nothing that will make you feel good.
But it's one of those books that you will remember and re-read.
Highly recommended!
Many thanks to Random House UK and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

This is a demanding but ultimately fulfilling read. It is a book in two halves, the first half is a set of short stories which introduce 9 characters, all affected in some way by trees.
In the second half they come together to fight for the future of trees. The short stories are excellent and segue well into the second half which I found slightly too long.
But this is a thought provoking book which will stay with me for some time.