When the Forest Breathes

Renewal and Resilience in the Natural World

By: Suzanne Simard

Narrated by: Suzanne Simard

Brought to you by Penguin.

The trailblazing scientist returns with a book that centres nature’s cycles of renewal in the future vision of our forests
When the forest breathes out, we breathe in. When the forest thrives, we thrive.
The world-renowned forest ecologist Suzanne Simard has transformed our understanding of the profound intelligence and interconnectedness of trees. In When the Forest Breathes, she uncovers how the deep-rooted cycles of renewal that sustain the forest can also help us to protect our entire global ecosystem.

Raised in a family of loggers committed to sustainable stewardship of the land, Simard has watched as timber companies leave the forests of her native British Columbia vulnerable to wildfires and drought, threatening the crucial biodiversity that they support. But her groundbreaking research for the Mother Tree Project – one of the most ambitious forest ecology experiments of its kind – has the potential to chart a new course. The forest, she reveals, is a living symphony of finely honed cycles of birth, growth, death and rebirth that hold the key to protecting the natural world. Working closely with local Indigenous communities, whose sustainable practices have been largely ignored, Simard examines how holistic, regenerative forestry that preserves the cycles of the forest can help solve the global climate crisis.

Weaving together scientific discoveries and luminous storytelling, Simard’s book is a call to rediscover our kinship with the natural world, and listen to the lessons of the forest.

© Suzanne Simard 2026 (P) Penguin Audio 2026

Critic reviews

The Indiana Jones of trees returns... Inspiring... few people can speak about trees with quite as much conviction as Simard... She is a Canadian national treasure and global environmental icon (Mythili Rao)

Practical as well as passionate... a combination of personal memoir, scientific explanation and praise for indigenous and ancient traditions (Victor Mallet)

Suzanne Simard has helped transform our understanding of the profound intelligence and interconnectedness of trees (Liz Else)