Botanical Curses and Poisons: The Shadow Lives of Plants

Product Information

Content warnings: Discussions of death, murder, poisoning, injury, medical symptoms, miscarriage and other medical grimness. At a fundamental level, we are all sustained by plants, either from the oxygen they supply or from the food they can provide or by using them to build shelters. But we would be foolish to think of them as passive lifeforms that can accept being munched by any passing animal. They have developed sophisticated defences to stop them from disappearing down the gullet of a herbivore. These defences can vary from the spiked leaves, sour-tasting stems all the way to the utterly lethal parts of some plants that can kill an animal in a short space of time. I think I have found a new favourite Non-Fiction recommendation folks! I don't read a lot of Non-Fiction, and there is always an unknown around how accessible the writing is going to be... and there are no such worries here. This is a glorious book; beautifully and lovingly written, completely engaging and utterly compelling. Some of these I know from childhood, I remember being told very sternly that I must never ever touch the glistening berries of the Deadly Nightshade that I used to see growing down the lane near my house. I grew to learn which plants could hurt when you fell off your bike into them and even contemplating touching a mushroom was forbidden. Thankfully in this beautiful book by Fez Inkwright, the knowledge of which plants to avoid has been brought bang up to date.

Review: Botanical Curses and Poisons – A Cat, A Book, and A Review: Botanical Curses and Poisons – A Cat, A Book, and A

I'm not a plant aficionado. Hell, I can't keep a cactus alive. This book isn't here to shame; it's here to inspire. Okay, that may not be the healthiest thing...probably shouldn't take too much advice from this particular text. Inkwright has crafted a book that educates and entertain it's reader. There's an intriguing relationship between how writers have discussed these botanicals, how they've been used to kill (intentional and accidental), and what makes them spectacular. I was surprised by most of this book. Some of these things I already knew, but even in the plants I read about that I thought I knew about, I learned unexpected things, whether it was mythology or historical usage or maybe a bit of both. It ended up being, quite frankly, one of the most illuminating plant books I’ve ever read. The accessible prose and the subject matter combined to create a book I both couldn’t put down and couldn’t stop thinking about.This book is filled with meticulous detail on plants, the history behind poisoning and how a plant used to heal can be lethal if the incorrect dose is given.

Botanical Curses and Poisons - Liminal 11 Botanical Curses and Poisons - Liminal 11

People have learnt the very hard way over time immemorial which plants are safe and which are deadly. People have used this plant knowledge too for all sorts of nefarious dealings too, planning a murder using the poisons from a plant requires careful and deliberate preparation. Yet some of these plants have a very grey line between medicine and toxin and knowing what plant is capable of what normally needs an expert. This collection is a stellar roundup of tales that capture the birth of the botanical gothic genre. Published in the span of 1844 to 1932, the 14 short fiction works in the collection are written by some of the greatest gothic writers in history. Daisy Butcher gives a fascinating and insightful introduction that will make you want to dive deeper into the collected stories and the genre itself. 2. Chlorophobia: An Eco-Horror Anthology by A.R. Ward Overall, an interesting and informative reference book that I would be interested to see in other formats. My current WIP features a carnivorous plant that I invented. When I got to the carnivorous plant section, I learned that it would likely be a part of the sundew family and not entirely impractical in it's invention. This is what I mean by inspiration. There's a never-ending supply of fun ways to kill characters. Perfect for any mischievous writer. The reason tomatoes are included in this tome is worth the retail price. Gamers never feel more present and alive than when their efforts come to fruition; GMs will weave crooked quests concerning the gathering of ingredients for poisons or curatives, players will brew concoctions of deadly verdance for the sake of good or ill. This is an essential companion for the darkly poetic, the riddler, the night elf. Imbue your Druids with dripping poison sap, your carefully whittled arrows with unspeakable banes, your potions with natural scourges. Create notable villains that offer vile physic - and wise player characters that plait thorns in their hair and might well have been raised in jagged-leaf nettle beds.The facts presented about the plants are as varied as the range of plants covered. Each entry might span many different cultures and touch on information like how plants got their name, how they were used during different time periods, what superstitions people had about them and why. (And if you’re an academic nerd like me, rest assured that it’s all very well cited!) The broad nature of the knowledge conveyed is cool because it gives a more thorough picture of what life is like in these different cultures. Names, in particular, have a lot to say about the societal values of a time. One of my favorite examples of that is Devil’s Bit, named because the highly medicinal roots were also abnormally short, leading people to believe that the devil “bit” off the rest of the roots so less medicine could be made from them. The different utilities people found for plants that are toxic are interesting too—for example, bug collectors used to place live specimens in a jar with crushed laurel leaves so the toxic fumes from the laurel would kill the insect without damaging it. The American Dirty Pair comics by Toren Smith and Adam Warren are some of the best comics of the 90s... It is well known how plants have been used through time for healing and their medicinal properties, but as with all nature where there is good bad will surely follow. If you drink much from a bottle marked ‘poison’, it is almost certain to disagree with you, sooner or later.’

Botanical Curses and Poisons: The Shadow-Lives of Plants

I’m a big gardener, and I’m also a fantasy author. When I started writing one of my current works in progress, I realized that after the pandemic and health issues and all the emotional upheaval and stress from that, I wanted to write a book that was maybe a bit softer, with a magic system that paid homage to the plant world that I love so much. But I didn’t really want a “kitchen witch” feel to the magic. I wanted something else entirely. I settled on a “flower magic” system. I already knew I had a few poisonous/toxic plants in my garden but I was amazed to discover the violet, which I always thought was such a happy little flower was so associated with death and the underworld.

My Book Notes

Who knew that a book/almanac on poisons plants would bring me this much enjoyment? Seriously the way the author lures you in with mythology from all around the world is its own kind of witchcraft. HurriCon, a now-biannual fundraiser event for the Bethany Congregational Church, was founded by community member David Donovan in 2018. My... The book is a fascinating cornucopia, filled with a wealth of knowledge both botanical and historical so that reading it becomes more of a journey through the history of both herblore and folklore. Alongside the intricate descriptions of plants and their uses, I have loved reading the references to poets and writers which help to bring the book alive in such a glorious way.

Botanical Curses And Poisons by Fez Inkwright | Waterstones

If you drink much from a bottle marked ‘poison,’ it is almost certain to disagree with you, sooner or later.” – Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland Desirable for the stunning cover and gorgeous interior illustrations alone, I wanted to include this nonfiction book about the shadow-lives of plants. Fez Inkwright gives a brief history of poisons and then includes an A-Z of the dark side of plants. It’s a handy guide that I know will be by my side for inspiration for a long time to come! Plant Your Roots in Botanical GothicI’ll be honest, at first a book about just poisons didn’t seem as wide of a topic as a book about herbal medicine in general, and so I was surprised to see that Botanical Curses and Poisons is actually quite a bit longer than Folk Magic and Healing. But describing it as a book about poisons is selling it short. Lots of plants can be poisonous but only in specific ways—maybe only a certain part of the plant is toxic or it’s dangerous only if prepared in a certain way. (Inky cap mushrooms, for instance, are safe to eat unless consumed with alcohol, at which point they become poisonous.) Plus, in addition to poisonous plants, it covers all sorts of plants with sinister history, ranging from uses in dark magic to mythological associations with death. The latter is actually a huge category, as there are all sorts of fascinating reasons a plant would become associated with death—perhaps it’s the favored flower of a goddess of death, or it might grow in graveyards, or it smells like rotting flesh, or maybe it just has a pale and spectral look that made people think of ghosts. Beans were associated with death in the British Isles because people noticed that more accidents happened in the mines during the season when bean plants flower, which was definitely caused by the beans and not the fact that mines were more dangerous during the rainy season! Other plants have built-in abilities that can feel sinister or malevolent. Cogon grass is very flammable and burns hotter than regular flames, an ability it uses to burn down the other plants around it to make room for cogon shoots to sprout in the newly barren earth. Today is my spot on the blog tour for 𝐁𝐎𝐓𝐀𝐍𝐈𝐂𝐀𝐋 𝐂𝐔𝐑𝐒𝐄𝐒 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐏𝐎𝐈𝐒𝐎𝐍𝐒; ᴛʜᴇ ꜱʜᴀᴅᴏᴡ-ʟɪᴠᴇꜱ ᴏꜰ ᴘʟᴀɴᴛꜱ by Fez Inkwright. Thank you to Anne Cater at Random Things Tours and Liminal 11 for sending me a copy of this beautiful book. While each plant does get an overview of history, mythology, and the like, it is just an overview. Important information is given, and I used many of these bits of what I learned as I read to give me jumping-off points for further reading. IE: I went on many an internet deep dive doing research to learn more about these plants after I read about them. For this reason, I will say, this is a book best savored rather than devoured. There’s a ton of information here, but if you’re like me, you’ll be, “Oh, that’s interesting, I want to learn more” google searching as you read. It’ll slow your progress down a bit, but that’s okay, because this is one of those books that is best savored. It’s just, quite frankly, that good. I'm Asha and the one constant in my life is that I have always had an enormous, overflowing pile of books to read. Physically. In my house. Taking up all the space. Threatening to break the bookshelves. It's probably about time I read them.