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American
Horticultural Society
The American Gardener
May/June 2006 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 May/June 2006 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
Regional Gardening
BOOK REVIEWS
Recommendations for Your Gardening Library
 P.
Allen Smith's Colors for the Garden: Creating Compelling Color Themes
P. Allen Smith. Clarkson Potter, New York, New York, 2006. 192 pages.
Publisher’s price, hardcover: $32.50.
Buy This Book
Plants such as annuals, perennials, grasses, shrubs, and tropicals add
both color and texture to the garden. However, not many references focus
on the colors and how to use them effectively in home garden
design—something that P. Allen Smith’s latest book, Colors for the
Garden, aims to do through a blend of practical commentary, detailed
plant lists, and vibrant color photographs.
In the first two sections of the book, Smith addresses
choosing colors and how to use them creatively. Here you will get some
straightforward ideas on how to use various plants within color themes,
how to mix and match colors, and suggestions on specific plants to
design with.
Smith suggests several helpful activities in these first
two sections—for example, taking photographs of the outside of your home
and garden. “By framing the view through the lens and in pictures, the
shapes of plants, buildings, and objects become more apparent,” he
writes. “Use the photographs to create or improve the garden settings
around your home.”
The third section of the book, titled “Color
Expressions,” describes plant colors in detail. Here you will find many
of the common and not-so-common varieties of plants arranged in color
sequence. The directory includes a short description, a few facts
including height, sun or shade tolerance, and winter hardiness (if
perennial). This section is especially useful when you need color
clarification on a plant you are not familiar with.
With so many flowers and colors available, you might ask,
“Which ones should I use?” Follow the color design principles within the
book to make them blend, but the colors to start with, as Smith
suggests, are the ones you love best.
Jim Nau
Jim Nau is the manager of the Gardens at Ball, the Ball Horticultural
Company’s newly renovated display and evaluation garden in West Chicago,
Illinois.
 Gardens
by Design
Noel Kingsbury, photography by Nicola Browne. Timber Press, Portland,
Oregon, 2005. 224 pages. Publisher’s price, hardcover: $34.95.
Buy This Book
Planting Design: Gardens in Time and Space
Piet Oudolf and Noel Kingsbury. Timber Press, Portland, Oregon, 2005.
176 pages. Publisher’s price, hardcover: $34.95.
Buy This Book
As a refreshing and illuminating change from the usual garden design
book which is the voice and vision of just one person, Noel Kingsbury’s
Gardens by Design has tips, insight, and wisdom from some of the most
respected and creative garden designers in the English-speaking world.
Generously illustrated with superb photographs by Nicola Browne, the
book is divided into sections that cover the usual topics: Planning,
furnishing, and planting the garden. Within that structure, Kingsbury
lets each designer speak, sharing his or her thoughts.
A few examples include Vermont-based designer Julie Moir
Messervy, who states that a garden path should be viewed as a journey
that, “alters the psyche, refreshes the soul, and reinvigorates the
senses.” An analysis of Piet Oudolf’s garden in the Netherlands shows
the reader how a traditional formal design can be given a modern twist
by creating what Kingsbury calls “zigzag symmetry.”
 Alternative
plans for a long, narrow garden space and a boring square lot, along
with detailed explanations of the thought process that went into the
design, highlight the chapter focusing on the work of Jill Billington,
who is renowned for her creative designs for awkwardly shaped London
gardens. Beth Chatto discusses the importance of choosing plants that
are naturally adapted to the soil and light conditions of your
particular garden, and Carol Klein shares insights into combining flower
color, with recommendations for choices in cooler northern climes, hot
southern regions, and for different seasons.
In contrast, Planting Design: Gardens in Time and Space,
which Kingsbury co-authored with the internationally renowned Dutch
designer Piet Oudolf, is more a treatise on their philosophy and
practice of designing with plants. The focus of the book is blurred,
sometimes giving advice to designers of large-scale projects for
corporations or city parks, and at others addressing the home landscape
designer. It is not a book for beginners; plants are called by their
Latin names only, and the authors assume the reader already has a strong
foundation in the subject.
Having said that, the book is excellent as an advanced
course in Oudolf’s “New Wave” planting movement that advocates choosing
plants that are in harmony with the surrounding landscape, are well
adapted to the native soil and growing conditions, and that will develop
beautifully over time. The authors want to encourage landscape
architects and garden designers “to put the focus back on the art of
planting.”
Catriona Tudor Erler
Catriona Tudor Erler is the author of eight garden books, including
Poolscaping: Gardening and Landscaping Around Your Swimming Pool and Spa
(Storey Publishing, 2003).
 Cultivating
Words: The Guide to Writing about the Plants and Gardens You Love
Paula Panich. Tryphon Press, Northampton, Massachusetts, 2005. 129
pages. Publisher’s price, softcover: $21.95.
Buy This Book
Paula Panich has written the first and only book describing writing
about plants and gardens. A practical guide to everything from sentence
creation to publishing how-tos, this book is an inspiration for all to
put down spade and take up pad and pencil or face off with a word
processor.
Panich, with an M.F.A. and two decades of journalism and
garden writing experience, takes the novice writer and plant lover
through the creation of their first published pieces, whether in garden
club newsletters, local newspapers, or magazines. She describes the
types of stories a garden writer can create, such as the practical
how-to piece, or the feature story where writers might borrow some
techniques from fiction writing. There are also sections on
garden-related travel writing and the writer as storyteller.
The book describes how to begin an article with a well
crafted “lead”, and how to structure it, title the piece, and summarize
or quote information. There is useful advice on word usage, botanical
nomenclature, and writing for clarity with a chapter on self editing and
revision well titled, “Pruning and Patience: On Editing and Revision.”
The major points are reinforced with writing samples from
the author, well-known garden writers, and wonderful writers from
aligned genres such as Vita Sackville-West, M.F.K. Fisher, John McPhee,
and Diane Ackerman.
Many of today’s professional garden writers loved plants
first, and then learned how to write about them. All would have
benefited from having this guide at the beginning of their careers.
Darrell Trout
Darrell Trout is a writer, lecturer, and director of the Garden Writers
Association. His fourth book is First Garden: Getting Started in
Northeast Gardening.
Mini Review
 The
manicured, verdant lawn is a staple of American iconography. How did
this come to be when our climate is so variable and yet so generally
inhospitable to large swaths of sheared grass? Gardeners, often more
resistant than most to the seductive charms of the perfect lawn, can
find out what others find so alluring in American Green: The
Obsessive Quest for the Perfect Lawn Ted Steinberg.
W.W. Norton & Co 2006. 295 pages.
Buy This Book
Publisher’s price, hardcover: $24.95. History professor
Ted Steinberg charts the rise of lawn culture in the wake of World War
II, as “booms” in having babies, building houses, and using chemicals
combined with social forces encouraging conformity and aspirations
toward perfection to create a “perfect storm” of lawn care mania.
Despite his academic background, Steinberg has an
accessible and engaging style, and while he raises a lot of serious
questions about the impact of lawn culture on the environment (and a few
somewhat less serious ones about its impact on homeowners’ time and
self-esteem), he leaves room for hope that more Americans may yet
embrace a more relaxed aesthetic that allows for a wider plant palette,
a bit of brown in the winter, and even a weed here and there.
Linda McIntyre, Editorial Intern
GARDENER'S BOOKS
Regional Gardening
American gardens do not lend themselves to generalizations. Average
temperature, moisture, and soil quality vary tremendously from region to
region within the United States, and sometimes within regions as well.
Every gardener needs a few comprehensive reference books, but sometimes
you want an in-depth guide to dealing with conditions in your own region
and selecting plants that will thrive. Here are some books to help you
plan, start, or enhance your garden wherever you are.
 Since
I began gardening in the mid-Atlantic region in the early 1990s, I’ve
struggled with drought, hurricanes, drying winds, humidity, and damage
from swarms of 17-year cicadas. So I was not surprised to be drawn to
the Mid-Atlantic Top 10 Garden Guide (Sunset, 2006, $19.95)
Buy This Book,
with its comprehensive listing of plants sturdy enough to take whatever
our variable climate dishes out. Well-known experts—including Brent and
Becky Heath of Brent and Becky’s Bulbs, Holly Shimizu of the U.S.
Botanic Garden, and The American Gardener’s own contributing editor Rita
Pelczar and contributing writer Carole Ottesen—provide concise,
straightforward advice with enough opinion to keep things interesting.
 Southerners
contemplating starting a garden will find lots of helpful and accessible
information in How to Get Started in Southern Gardening by Nellie
Neal with Rob Proctor (Cool Springs Press, 2005, $19.99)
Buy This Book.
The introduction, by Proctor, grounds the reader in the basics of
gardening—botanical nomenclature, tools, and maintenance tips—while the
rest of the book, by Neal, digs deeper, starting with a very good
discussion of soil amendment. She goes on to discuss design elements
such as hardscape and lighting, and provides a list of 50 plants that
are easy to grow in USDA zones 7, 8, and 9. Pests and diseases are
covered too, in the same enthusiastic yet down-to-earth tone that
characterizes the whole book. It also includes a handy list of
mail-order resources sources, garden information and extension websites,
and suggested reading for those who have built up enough confidence to
move on to more daunting volumes.
 Midwest
Home Landscaping (Creative Homeowner, 2006, $19.95)
Buy This Book
covers a lot of ground, both literally and figuratively. It aims to help
gardeners from southern Canada to Missouri, from the Dakotas to Ohio, to
design beds and borders, choose and care for plants, and install
hardscape, fencing, and other garden features. This information-packed
book features a variety of planting designs for all parts of your
property, with photos, vivid illustrations, and detailed schematic
drawings that reflect the design vernacular of the Midwest. The planting
advice is sound, as one would expect from veteran garden writers Roger
Holmes and Rita Buchanan, with good information on choosing healthy
plants, planting basics, pruning, and winter protection. There’s also a
list of dependable plants with an emphasis on selections with at least
two seasons of interest.
 Gardeners
in northern California might not enjoy quite the range of climatic
vicissitudes as their Midwestern brethren, but with coastal, valley, and
mountainous climate zones, garden writer Katherine Grace Endicott has
plenty to talk about in Northern California Gardening (2006,
Chronicle Books, $24.95)
Buy This Book.
This is a month-by-month guide with a wealth of horticultural
information that will benefit new and experienced gardeners alike. For
each month, Endicott lists key tasks for gardeners in each climate
zone—what to plant, prune or harvest; how to keep down pests and
diseases; and tips on keeping plants well-watered during dry periods.
There’s plenty of information for gardeners outside northern California
as well, such as which “old rules” (such as “buy the largest plant you
can”) to ignore, how to reach an accommodation with deer, and excellent
cultural information for houseplants and plants widely grown in other
regions.
 Perennials
for the Southwest (Timber Press, 2006, $29.95)
Buy This Book
would look at home on your coffee table. But beneath its beautiful cover
and sophisticated graphics lies a workhorse of a book written by Mary
Irish, an authority on dry-climate gardening. She starts with a detailed
discussion of design principles suited to gardens in the arid southwest.
The section on plant care covers soil, pruning, pests and diseases, and
propagation in a thorough yet straightforward manner, and the plant list
provides tips on use in the landscape as well as abundant cultural
information. For southwestern gardeners, this book is indispensable; for
the rest of us, it’s a vacation to a beautiful and exotic landscape.
Linda McIntyre, Editorial Intern
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