The title is a stopper, and meant to be. The book is extremely sophisticated, detailed and convincing. 100 or even 50 years ago, no one could have made a case for plant intelligence, but dramatic research findings over the last decades have shown that plants--although they lack nervous systems--have exceedingly complex internal communication, mediated by chemicals (plant hormones, ions, etc.). Trewavas provides full details on the chemistry. There is communication even within cells, but what is impressive is the amount of communication and even decision-making that goes on in the whole plant. It has to decide how to grow toward light and away from shade, toward water and nutrients and away from sterile soil, etc. We once thought this was a simple, automatic process, but the reality has turned out to be as chemically and strategically complicated as decision-making in simple invertebrate animals. The real shocker, though, was the discovery several years ago that plants communicate with each other, by releasing chemicals into air and soil. Most of the chatter is about predators: a nibbled leaf signals the root, the root signals neighboring roots, and other trees deploy anti-herbivore defense systems. The new findings show that plants are not about to challenge humans, but are as intelligent and communicative as the more primitive animals. Trewavas gives much detail on these comparison animals. He devotes much attention to defining "behavior" and "intelligence," and showing how broad definitions of these terms cannot exclude plants (or, for that matter, slime molds, hydras, etc.). In short, this is a new way to look at plants. Those who haven't been keeping up on the new work are in for a real surprise. Those who have been talking to their plants for years will feel vindicated (plants don't understand human speech--sorry--but they certainly respond to good care), but, more to the point, they will get a solid dose of serious chemistry and genetics to back them up.The one problem with this book is that it was apparently not copyedited at all. When I published with OUP, they did meticulous copyediting. They seem to have stopped. There are comma faults on almost every page, misspellings (e.g. Gardener for Gardner on p. 194), and that grossest of errors, using an apostrophe in a plural ("the ideas of the Darwin's--Erasmus and Charles," p. 216). There are poorly structured sentences, and even some sentences I can't decode--apparently printing errors that nobody caught. There is misidentification of Greek as "Latin" (p. 256, etymology). Shame on Oxford UP. This book deserves better.