Two remarks of detail which came to me while passing over passages of your book:
In the chapter on bacteria, you write that they are organisms that have very simple DNA. I happen to be immersing myself in another book on fermentation. What I read about bacteria there is fascinating: it seems that microbiologists and others are talking about the amazing abilities of bacteria to interact with the potentials of the surrounding genome. For example, unlike our eukaryotic cells with fixed DNA, prokaryotic bacteria "have floating genes which they exchange with each other". So much so that we could not really speak of distinct species for these bacteria! "Bacteria are more of a continuum." These gene exchanges would explain the incredible adaptive capacity and resilience of bacteria, which thus choose to carry the genes they need at the time by transferring them from other bacteria! The researchers are thus recomposing a new image of bacteria: far from being simplistic and inferior forms of life, they are on the contrary highly evolved organisms bringing into play complex forms of resilience and survival and which co-evolve with other living beings (plants , animals...).
In the chapter on mushrooms, you write that these are the only organisms to break down lignin. I do not know where it came from this time but I remembered that woodlice attacked woody material as well. Do you have details?