Mushrooms: The natural and human world of British fungi

Description

Mushrooms, the first of a major new series of books on British natural history, provides a remarkable insight into the natural and human world of fungi. Peter Marren, in his inimitable, relaxed style, guides the reader through the extraordinary riches of this often overlooked group, from the amazing diversity of forms and lifestyles that populate the fungal landscape, to the pursuit of edible fungi for the pot, and the complexities of identification thrown up by our modern understanding of DNA. Throughout the book, the author tells a story rich in detail about how we have come to appreciate and, in some cases, fear the mushrooms and toadstools that are such an integral part of the changing seasons. Marren also provides a refreshingly candid view of our attempts to name species, the role of fungi in ecosystems, and our recent efforts to record and conserve them.

Peter Marren is a natural history writer and former government and freelance conservationist. He is a wildlife polymath whose writings extend from newspaper journalism, obituaries, book reviews and opinion pieces to humour and news summaries for the likes of Whitaker's Almanack. His twenty books include a quarter-million-word cultural survey of invertebrates (Bugs Britannica), a bibliographic biography (The New Naturalists), a study of rarity (Britain's Rare Flowers), art criticism (Art of the New Naturalists), urban wildlife (A Natural History of Aberdeen) and humour (Twitching through the Swamp). He has written for every issue of British Wildlife since 1990, including many articles and news pieces about fungi. He regularly leads fungus forays into the wilds of Wiltshire and Berkshire.

The biggest attraction of all is Marren's writing: quirky, trenchantly observant, sometimes hilarious, full of engaging anecdotes and as far from the soulless impersonal tone of a fungi field guide as it is possible to get. Implausible as it may seem, here indeed is a man's relationship with mushrooms, in fact, his extravagant love affair with them. It is the single best book on the natural world I have read this year. -- Michael McCarthy * The Independent * A wonderfully eclectic book about the strange world of fungi, by one of the best nature writers in Britain today -- Stephen Moss * The Guardian *