The genius of trees: how forests have shaped humanity, from chocolate cravings to our ability to dream

Since our early ancestors came down from the canopy, we may think we have learned how to live without trees. But our lives remain intertwined in incredible ways

Once upon a time there was a girl who lived in a tree. She had deep-set brown eyes and brown hair. She ate fruit - orange mangosteen and black juniper berries - crunched on nuts, sucked on sweet grasses and chewed juicy leaves, and dug up tubers and roots, knowing which ones were good, and which were hard or poisonous.

Sometimes, she followed the trails that crisscrossed through the grass, but much of the time she clambered through the broad crowns of the trees, reaching up for branches and feeling the texture of the bark against her hands, balancing against the trunks and springing along boughs. At night she tucked herself into the fork of several branches and curled up to sleep, watching stars like diamonds and branches against the sky.