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American
Horticultural Society
The American Gardener
November/December 2008
Recommended Garden Books
Because the AHS Horticultural Book
Service was discontinued as of June 30, 2000 no further phone or mail orders
are filled. However, AHS members are still be able to order books at a
discount by linking to Amazon.com through the Society's Web site. Through this
partnership with Amazon.com, AHS members can receive better discounts on most
titles, faster delivery, greater inventory, and improved access to
hard-to-find books. The books listed here have not been critically evaluated;
they have been chosen for description based on unusual subject matter or
substantive content.
The following books are our current
recommended garden books from the November/December 2008 issue of
The American Gardener. To read the review just click on the
book title. You can then order the book directly from Amazon.com by clicking
on "Buy this book!" that follows each review.
BOOK REVIEWS
Recommendations for Your Gardening Library
BOOK REVIEWS
Recommendations for Your Gardening Library
 Perennial
Combinations
C. Colston Burrell. Rodale Books, Emmaus, Pennsylvania, 2008. 384 pages.
Publisher’s price, softcover: $22.95.
Buy This Book
Designer Plant Combinations
Scott Calhoun. Storey Publishing, North Adams, Massachusetts, 2008. 240
pages. Publisher’s price, softcover: $18.95.
Buy This Book
Gardeners and designers looking for new plant ideas will find more than
they can use in these two books, both packed with information on plant
combinations for small and large gardens alike. The books are published
in essentially the same format: they are about the same size, with
lovely photographs of eye-catching plant combinations, short and simple
text to explain the planting concepts, and special tips and techniques
to achieve spectacular results. But the books are also quite different:
C. Colston Burrell takes a plantsman’s approach to perennial
combinations, while Scott Calhoun concentrates on combinations with
design impact and includes trees and shrubs as well as perennials and
annuals.
 Perennial
Combinations is a 1999 hardcover book that has been expanded and
updated, with a new chapter on big, bold plants that in recent years
have zoomed in popularity. Burrell’s book is divided into chapters that
let you choose what suits your property. These include combinations for
color, seasonal interest, and for special sites (sunny, shady, sandy,
etc); for wild areas (woodlands, meadows) and for fun (butterflies and
fragrance). Each entry in Perennial Combinations includes a color photo
with a key to the plants, plus special tips that will allow you to
create similar combinations using the perennials that are best for your
particular region. Burrell also includes schematic drawings of garden
designs featuring combinations for sunny sites, wet sites, bold foliage,
bold accents, and a variety of other effects and situations.
In Designer Plant Combinations, Scott Calhoun’s chapters
delve into combinations for different classes of plants: perennial
partners, masses of grasses, accent plant associates, groundcover
groupies, and more. Each section has background pages of a different
color, making it very easy to find your way around the book. All of the
photo vignettes feature six plants or less, with a profile of each plant
and a “designer tip” that tells the reader how to achieve the same
effect. These tips include how to work with plants from a painter’s
perspective, “celebrate the seed head,” grow vines through trees, design
with weeping trees, plant pathways, and rein in “speedsters,” or
fast-growing trees and shrubs.
If you’re more interested in plants, Perennial
Combinations might be your choice, and if you’re bent on terrific
design, you’d be better off with Designer Plant Combinations. My advice
is to pick up a copy of each. They will open your mind to limitless new
possibilities that can make any garden a unique and creative outdoor
refuge.
Jane Berger
Jane Berger is a landscape designer based in Washington, D.C. and the
publisher of
http://www.gardendesignonline.com.
 The
Heirloom Tomato
Amy Goldman. Bloomsbury USA, New York, New York, 2008. 272 pages.
Publisher’s price, hardcover: $35.
Buy This Book
If the 16th-century Flemish botanist Rembert Dodoens had read The
Heirloom Tomato, he wouldn’t have claimed that America’s favorite
vegetable “be of two sortes, one red and the other yellowe, but in all
other poyntes they be lyke.” Author Amy Goldman establishes that
tomatoes - which technically are fruits despite the U.S. Supreme Court’s
1887 ruling in Nix v. Hedden that they were vegetables - are of many
sortes and far from lyke.
Coffee-table books, and this volume is pure Lycopersicon
eye candy thanks to Victor Schrager’s gorgeous photographs, are rarely
as informative, interesting, and well written as is The Heirloom Tomato.
In addition to a brief but first-rate guide to cultivating tomatoes, it
details 200 heirloom, open-pollinated (OP) varieties, most of which have
been around for decades, lovingly handed down from one generation to the
next.
There are some entries - ‘Oregon Spring’, a 1984 creation
from Jim Baggett, is an example - that minimally qualify as true
heirlooms (which purists would say are pre-1945 varieties maintained in
a particular region or within a family). The Johnny-come-lately
tomatoes, usually termed “created heirlooms,” also are stable OPs and
often are bred from heirlooms such as ‘Tidwell German’, which was grown
for 100 years by the same Tennessee family.
Goldman, who is board chair of the noteworthy Seed Savers
Exchange, trialed all 200 tomatoes (and hundreds more) over five seasons
in her Hudson Valley garden in New York. For each variety she specifies
size and weight, shape, color, soluble solids (a measure of sweetness),
flavor, texture, best uses, plant habit, leaf type, yield, maturity,
origin, synonyms, and seed sources. Each entry also is accompanied by
lively comments and history. Did you know that seeds for ‘Nebraska
Wedding’ are still given to a few brides in the cornhusker state? Or
that the ‘Delicious’ tomato that weighed seven pounds, 12 ounces holds a
Guinness World Record?
One thing we also learn is that “heirloom” doesn’t always
mean better. Twenty-seven tomatoes are judged “poor” in flavor, with
‘Schimmeig Creg’ receiving a “nonexistent” flavor rating. Its firm
texture, however, makes it valuable “breeding material” and worth
preserving. At the other end of the scale is ‘Red Brandywine’. Goldman
describes the flavor of this beefsteak, which has been around since
1889, as “perfection.” Try it in one of the four dozen recipes that are
included - it’s heaven sent for the Tomato and Fontine Panini.
Karan Davis Cutler
Karan Davis Cutler lives in Vermont, where she wrestles with heavy clay
soil and cold, windy winters. Her most recent book is Burpee-The
Complete Flower Gardener (Wiley, 2006).
GARDENER’S BOOKS
Fascinating Flowers
Picture a flower in your mind. What do you see? Ask a
thousand gardeners and you would probably get different answers from
them all. A fragrant rose. A brilliant sunflower. A spray of tiny
forget-me-nots. Though flowers may be composed of similar basic parts,
what’s fascinating is their sheer diversity. We can’t get enough of
their kaleidoscopic colors, seductive scents, myriad forms, and varied
textures. So now that winter is setting in, if you find yourself missing
summer’s profusion of blooms, these books may alleviate your floral
withdrawal.
 In
Pink Ladies and Crimson Gents (Clarkson Potter, $22.50, 2008)
Buy This Book
Molly Glentzer provides a decadent dose of rose lore as
she explores how 50 old-fashioned varieties got their names. Lifestyle
editor for the Houston Chronicle, Glentzer delves into the “fascinating
but relatively uncharted territory where horticulture and human culture
collide,” by examining the connections between roses and the intriguing
personalities for which they are named. From ‘Mozart’, a pink and white
hybrid musk introduced in 1937, to ‘Mrs. Pierre S. duPont’, a yellow
hybrid tea introduced in 1929, Glentzer paints a compelling picture of
why each rose is a fitting tribute to its namesake. Every essay is
accompanied by a rose portrait, modeled after classic botanical
illustrations.
 The
beauty of flowers has inspired art of all kinds, and Mr. Marshal’s
Flower Book (Viking Studio, $26.95, 2008)
Buy This Book
is a wonderful example of the art of botanical illustration. It features
selections from Florilegium - the only surviving collection of flower
watercolors from 17th-century England - containing paintings by
horticulturist, entomologist, and self-taught artist Alexander Marshal.
After a brief introduction that contains a biographical sketch of
Marshal, this book showcases 140 of his illustrations organized by their
season of bloom. These richly rendered paintings provide a captivating
glimpse of the era’s most fashionable flowers such as tulips,
carnations, and primroses as well as native English wildflowers.
 Creating
arrangements with cut flowers is another popular floral art form. In
Simply Elegant Flowers (North Light Books, $30, 2008),
Buy This Book
Michael George - florist for big name designers such as Vera Wang and
Giorgio Armani, not to mention Martha Stewart who wrote the book’s
foreword - shares tips and techniques garnered from a lifetime of
working with flowers. “In my philosophy, I attempt to arrange them as
they are in nature, which is already perfect,” he says of his modern,
monochromatic style. The first section of the book brims with advice
ranging from what to look for when buying flowers and how to maximize
their vase-life to setting up an effective workspace with the
appropriate tools. Part two takes a seasonal approach, suggesting
arrangements to make when various flowers are typically in bloom. Many
of the book’s luscious color photographs are as artistic as the
arrangements themselves, and how-to instructions are amply illustrated.
 For
another take on flower arranging, there’s Ikebana by Shozo Sato
(Tuttle Publishing, $49.95, 2008).
Buy This Book
“Ikebana arrangements,” writes Sato, “are expected not only to establish
a link between man and nature but also to create a mood or atmosphere
appropriate to the season, and even to the occasion - a tradition in
keeping with the Japanese focus on the ephemeral nature of life, as
well.” The book begins with an overview of Ikebana’s history in Japan.
Subsequent sections explain the different styles - from the classic
Rikka to the more contemporary forms - and cover the basic tools and
techniques for creating each of these. Striking color photographs and
line drawings provide further guidance for creating Ikebana arrangements
of your own. You’ll also find a list of plants that lend themselves well
to this art form, along with the symbolic meanings they have in Japanese
culture.)
 On
the practical side, The Flower Farmer (Chelsea Green Publishing,
$35, 2008)
Buy This Book
by Lynn Byczynski, is a guide to growing and selling organic cut
flowers. Originally published in 1997, this updated and expanded edition
takes into account the effects of a changing climate, new flower
selections that have been introduced, and changes in the flower
marketplace that have occurred in the last decade. Along with everything
from bed preparation and seed starting to harvesting, arranging, and
marketing flowers, Byczynski has added a new chapter on strategies for
extending the growing season. The book concludes with an appendix of
nearly 100 recommended genera for fresh or dried cut flowers, as well as
a helpful list of sources and resources.
Kirsten Winters, Editorial Intern
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