|
American
Horticultural Society
The American Gardener
July/August 2003 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 July/August 2003 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
GARDENER’S BOOKS
Noteworthy New Titles with a Regional
Twist
BOOK REVIEWS
Recommendations for Your Gardening Library
 Time
and the Gardener: Writings on a Lifelong Passion.
Elisabeth Sheldon. Beacon Press, Boston, 2003. 276 pages. Publisher’s price,
hardcover: $17.50
Buy This Book
Is the columbine ‘Norah Barlow’ a horror? Should all double shasta daisies
except ‘Wirral Pride’ and ‘Aglaya’ be banished? What a delight to encounter a
writer who doesn’t blandly claim that all plants are created equal. If a plant
rampantly self sows, smothers its neighbors, or requires superhuman effort to
grow, Elisabeth Sheldon tells you so. She also describes plants that seem so
desirable, one is tempted to throw down the book and immediately go in search
of them. Sheldon is opinionated, knowledgeable, generous, and witty—just the
sort of garden companion most of us long for.
This collection of literate and
informative essays is divided into three parts: What I’ve Learned Over Time;
Timeless Plants—Some of My Favorites; and Gardeners of Other Times. They
distill a lifetime of gardening experience combined with an artist’s awareness
of plants and their surroundings. Her discussion on gardening with purple
foliage will make you think about your garden combinations in a new and more
sensitive way. That ability to make you rethink your assumptions and really
see what is in front of you is worth the price of the book. In addition, her
essays on 18th- and 19th-century gardeners are gentle reminders of the
obstacles women once faced and the fact that gardening is not for the
simpering and faint hearted.
Time and the Gardener is perfect for
rainy days and cold winter evenings—not a lavish picture book, but a
collection of vividly written essays that will amuse you and change the way
you think about gardens and plants. You will return to it over and over to
refresh your vision and increase your knowledge.
—Norma Prendergast
Norma Prendergast is an art historian and garden writer who lives in
Ithaca, New York.
 The
Well-Designed Mixed Garden: Building Beds and Borders with Trees, Shrubs,
Perennials, Annuals, and Bulbs. Tracy DiSabato-Aust. Timber Press,
Portland, Oregon, 2003. 460 pages. Publisher’s price, hardcover: $27.97.
Buy This Book
I’ve never understood people who have a themed garden—a garden that consists
only of plants with silver foliage, for instance, or only Mediterranean or
tropical plants. To me, gardening means never having to say “no.” I want to
grow everything. Fortunately, Tracy DiSabato-Aust agrees. Her new book is a
gorgeous and practical guide to having it all.
She covers the basics of garden
design as they apply to a mixed border, addressing design principles, plant
selection, maintenance needs, and light and water requirements. But the most
amazing thing is that she does it in such a conversational style. She writes
informally, in the first person, making this one of those rare design books
that you can read from beginning to end like a novel.
In her chapter on color in the garden DiSabato-Aust talks about value,
intensity, and hue with the expertise of a painter, and she has included a
plant-based color wheel (chartreuse foliage in the light green section
contrasts perfectly with the magenta tulips directly across the wheel). I
found myself mentally rearranging my own garden as I read about analogous,
complementary, and triadic color schemes. Her approach is precise and
technical, but never intimidating. Best of all, almost all of her ideas work
in small gardens like mine, not just in expansive borders and botanical
gardens.
The Well-Designed Mixed Garden is one
of those enormous and comprehensive works that is equally at home on your
coffee table or out in the potting shed, where you can page though it as you
plant. Generous appendices of plant lists, color charts, and diagrams make the
book an essential reference tool.
—Amy Stewart
Amy Stewart is the author of From the Ground Up: The Story of a First
Garden.
 Climbing
Gardens: Adding Height and Structure to Your Garden. Joan Clifton. Special
photography by Steven Wooster. 144 pages. Firefly Books, Buffalo, New York,
2003. Publisher’s price, softcover: $19.95.
Buy This Book
Joan Clifton promises that adding the third dimension of height will transform
a garden “from a flat palette into a theatrical experience.” Consider how just
as a handful of props transforms a stage; in the same way, a trellis, obelisk,
arbor, or pergola can energize a border full of knee-high plants, contributing
scale, privacy, or perhaps a focal point to a design.
Think “climber” and the first image
that springs to mind may be a rustic, rose-covered arbor, but the excellent
photos that fill the pages of this book show a very broad range of styles,
from romantic cottage to formal contemporary, kitchen garden to meadow,
home-made to elaborately wrought. The gardens are of every size, too—from tiny
urban balconies to grand estates—with many ideas that are adaptable to
suburban properties. Sometimes the support visually disappears and the plants
take center stage. At other times, the structure itself, possessed of a bold
color or shape, captures the attention, becoming a form of functional
sculpture.
Clifton’s London-based company, Avant Garden, specializes in wrought-iron and
wirework forms for topiary, and examples are scattered throughout Climbing
Gardens. These designs are among the most intriguing in the book, perhaps
because they are not the typical off-the-shelf (or out-of-the-catalog)
examples we’ve all seen.
The book offers both inspiration and
information, with several spreads detailing projects, including how to
fabricate a formal wooden obelisk, a living willow arbor, a rustic gazebo, and
a free-form wire support for a vine.
Clifton’s text is thorough, offering
some history, design theory, how-to, and why-to. But the photography is the
most appealing part of the book. With more than 150 images, the book invites
browsing and the application of sticky notes to multiple pages. A brief plant
encyclopedia reviews how different plants climb—with terrific close-up
photos—and offers thumbnail sketches of the top herbaceous perennial, woody,
annual, and tender climbers.
—Renée Beaulieu
Renée Beaulieu, Internet editor for White Flower Farm Nursery, added trellises
to her small garden when she realized this allows her to jam even more plants
into a small space.
GARDENER’S BOOKS
Noteworthy New Titles with a Regional Twist
Thick slices of plump, sun-ripened
tomatoes, just off the vine. A savory pesto whipped up from your own fresh
herbs. An apple plucked from the tree, bursting with juice and sweet-tartness.
Is your mouth watering yet? Growing your own vegetables, herbs, and fruit can
be very satisfying, not to mention flavorful. By growing your own, you can
select the exact varieties you want and not have to worry about what might
have been sprayed on your produce. Even if you don’t grow your own, you can
share the thrill of fresh produce by investigating local farmers’ markets.
Lots of new books designed to help and inspire your edible gardening
activities have hit the shelves recently. Here are a few we found particularly
delicious.
A Passion for
Vegetables by Lorenza de’Medici (Pavillion Books, 2003, $24.50) will
inspire you, with its color drenched, still life photographs by Mike Newton
and its gourmet Italian recipes. Many, like gingered cucumber salad and
grilled radicchio with anchovies, pair unusual flavors. In addition to typical
garden veggies—tomatoes, lettuce, beans—de’Medici includes several less
familiar selections such as dandelion, cardoon, and celeriac.
Buy This Book
 You can
learn how to grow your vegetables, fruit, and herbs without chemicals, by
consulting Rodale’s Illustrated Encyclopedia of Organic Gardening,
edited by Pauline Pears (DK Press, 2002, $28). Topics include soil care, weed
control, gardening for wildlife, container gardening, and much more.
Particularly helpful is the “A–Z of Plant Problems,” which covers diseases and
pests, susceptible plants, and prevention and control techniques.
Buy This Book
 Gourmet
Vegetables, edited by Anne Raver (Brooklyn Botanic Garden, 2002, $9.95) is
a little book with a lot of information. Essays include “The Rewards of
Regionally Grown Foods,” “Growing the Winter Harvest,” and “Experimenting with
Ancient Crops.” Most of the book, however, is dedicated to individual
vegetables—selecting varieties, how to grow them, and how to use them.
Buy This Book
 If
space is a constraint, check out The Bountiful Container by Rose Marie
Nichols McGee and Maggie Stuckey (Workman Publishing, 2002, $11.87). The
authors provide lots of practical advice on getting the most out of your
available space, both in terms of edible produce and visual appeal. Individual
vegetables, herbs, fruit, and edible flowers that are adaptable to container
culture—and there are many more than you ever thought—are covered.
Interspersed among the plant discussions are recipes, both for colorful
container combinations, and for culinary treats.
Buy This Book
 On the
other hand, if you’ve space for a few trees—and an interest in flavors beyond
‘Granny Smith’ and ‘Red Delicious’—The New Book of Apples: the Definitive
Guide to Apples, Including Over 2,000 Varieties by Joan Morgan and Alison
Richards (Ebury Press, 2002, $38.50) is definitely worth consulting. This
revised edition of a book first published in 1993 includes some 100 new
varieties accessed in the last 10 years, as well as fresh details on many
older varieties. The history of the apple, addressed in the first part of the
book, makes surprisingly interesting reading, and is illustrated with
paintings by Elisabeth Dowle and numerous historic drawings and photographs.
The second part, “Directory of Apple Varieties,” is an extensive listing,
complete with origin and descriptions, of both old and new varieties.
Buy This Book
 Jekka
McVicar’s New Book of Herbs (DK Publishing, 2002, $21.00) tells you how
to grow, harvest, preserve, and use herbs. In addition to an extensive section
about culinary herbs, McVicar demonstrates how these most useful plants have a
place throughout the house, as cleaners, fragrances, first aid, beauty
treatments, and for relaxation and pet care. Her discussion of the “Top 100
Herbs” is organized for easy access, providing information on propagation,
site, maintenance, harvesting, and uses.
Buy This Book
 A
Celebration of Herbs: Recipes from the Huntington Herb Garden, edited by
Peggy Park Bernal, Judith Herman, and Jean Patterson (Huntington Library
Press, 2003, $29.95) is based on the lectures of Shirley Kerins, curator of
the Huntington Herb Garden. Innovative recipes for using herbs in breads, main
dishes, side dishes, jams, desserts, and beverages are accompanied by
interesting tidbits about herbal folklore, herbs in literature, and herbal
medicines.
Buy This Book
 If
you think vegetable gardens should be hidden out back, out of view, think
again. Susan J. Pennington’s Feast Your Eyes: the Unexpected Beauty of
Vegetable Gardens (University of California Press, 2002, $20.97) is sure
to change your mind. Pennington examines vegetable garden style, how it has
developed and changed through history, from the Ming Dynasty in China, to the
elaborate vegetable gardens of 17th-century Europe, and the Victory Gardens of
World Wars I and II in the United States. The 100 photographs and
paintings—both historic and contemporary—trace these changes, and illustrate
how ornamental vegetable garden design has come full circle, influencing home
vegetable gardens today. This is not a how-to book, but one that is sure to
inspire.
Buy This Book
 A
garden isn’t the only place where edible plants grow. For naturalists,
campers, and those of us who are simply curious about foraging, comes a
Department of the Army publication, The Illustrated Guide to Edible Wild
Plants (Lyons Press, 2003, $10.47). Did you know that the rhizomes of
cattails are a rich source of starch or that the fruit of bearberry can be
eaten raw or cooked, and that the young leaves yield a refreshing tea? This
book presents lots of familiar plants in a new light. You will learn that, if
you really had to, you could eat crunchy reindeer moss or steamed plantain
leaves, or you could brew a coffee substitute from beech nuts. Photographs
help you identify your dinner. The book also includes a section on poisonous
plants that you’d best avoid.
Buy This Book
 Recipes
for using your foraged plants are presented in abundance in The Wild
Vegetarian Cookbook (Harvard Common Press, 2002, $20.97) The subtitle
pretty much says it all: “A Forager’s Culinary Guide (in the Field or in the
Supermarket) to Preparing and Savoring Wild (and Not so Wild) Natural Foods,
with More than 500 Recipes.” Among the intriguing recipes are dandelion fried
rice, milkweed biryani, and pasta with cattails. Written by “Wildman” Steve
Brill, who has been guiding foraging tours in, of all places, New York City,
since 1982, this entertaining tome will have you examining your weeds with a
fresh perspective.
Buy This Book
 Completing
our survey of nifty edible gardening books is one that investigates where our
food comes from, and how local foods relate to the development of regional
culture. Coming Home to Eat: the Pleasures and Politics of Local Foods,
by Gary Paul Nabhan (Norton, 2002, $5.98), is based on the author’s first hand
experience. For a year, Nabhan limited his food intake to that which was
grown, raised, or foraged within a 200 mile radius of his home in Arizona. By
exploring local markets and farms, he discovered many unusual foods,
experienced successful local farming operations, and re-established a
connection between food and life.
Buy This Book
—Rita Pelczar, Associate Editor
|
