“How Flowers Made Our World: The Story of Nature’s Revolutionaries” by David George Haskell

c.2026, Viking, $32, 352 pages

The blooms on your kitchen counter won’t last long.

A colorful handful of flowers on the kitchen counter is a rare treat, not a forever-thing, but as you’ll see in the new book “How Flowers Made Our World” by David George Haskell, the effects of them are.

The rose tattoo on a bicep. The spontaneous stem gifted by a stranger. A garden filled with hydrangeas. Hard to imagine that just 200 million years ago, flowers didn’t exist but by 100 million years ago, they were nearly everywhere on Earth. Today, 90 percent of all the plants in our world are flower-bearing and if they weren’t here, we wouldn’t be either.

That’s a sobering thought: without flowers, modern plants wouldn’t propagate. The nature of the planet would be altered. No flowers mean no hummingbirds, bees, or butterflies, forests or savannas. The world would smell musty, the physiology of our sight would be different – and that’s if we survived. Without flower-bearers, herbivorous livestock would have nothing to eat, and since most of humanity’s food is grass-based, we’d likewise starve, too.’9

Some plants, says Haskell, are “bisexual,” possessing both male and female parts, while others “segregate” the sexes. Goatsbeard can carefully and beneficially crossbreed with the help of bees. Orchids feed on fungi, and they save tiny strands of it inside themselves. Grasses evolved to benefit from wildfires and, in turn, they create soil. Seagrasses help maintain marshes and keep waterbanks cleaner. Roses were instrumental in the creation of perfumes. Botanist Carl Linnaeus was so obsessed with growing tea in Sweden that he took to thievery.

Of course, plants are sometimes intentionally imported, moved for propagation – but others are more opportunistic…

They’re on your clothing. You’ve got them on your posters, pillows and plushy things. You see floral motifs so often in everyday life that it’s easy to miss them, but read “How Flowers Made Our World” and you’ll never look at a posey the same again.

Telling an ancient story through eight species of flowering plants, Haskell lets it sink into readers the importance of flowers of all kinds. He makes each story delightful and surprising by cluing us in on the secrets that are beneath our feet and below our noses, revealing historical advances and little-known floral facts that have surrounded us all along. This is the kind of book that’ll make you get on-your-knees, up-close-and-personal with the plants in your front yard. You’ll want to seek out hidden flowers you never knew were there. It might even spark you to appreciate weeds.

If you’re a gardener, in particular, you’ll relish this book for its open-hearted curiosity. If you care for houseplants, you like to eat, or you love a good science book, here it is. Find “How Flowers Made Our World,” open it up, and let your interest bloom.