NEW GLASSES AND A REVIEW - THE SALAD GARDEN BY JOY LARKCOM

I have new glasses and the world looks very odd. All my possessions have grown smaller yet the room is wider. I thought I had a medium sized laptop but it turns out it's quite small. I might even have suggested it could fit in a shoulder bag - if my shoulder bag hadn't shrunk too.

I've also bought a pair of prescription sun-glasses. The moment I put them on, my eyes relax. People who are surprised when they come across me staring into hedgerows are likely to be even more disconcerted now I have a spy-like appearance; for it's the sunglasses I'm wanting to wear all the time, even on cloudy days.

It's May Day. The sun is shining. I can hear thunder.

This is supposed to be a book review.

I love this book. I like this book so much I've been carrying it around with me. It's called 'the salad garden' (without capitals) and it's by joy larkcom (she doesn't have capitals either).

A while back I realised that, when reviewing a book, I tend to pay more attention than other bloggers (maybe undue attention) to the appearance, the weight, the size and the smell of a book. In part, this is because I guess gardeners fall into three categories: the mega gardeners who know everything, the middle gardeners who know what they need to know, and people who would like to garden, or dream of gardening. The mega-gardeners don't need books. The middle gardeners will already have a few instructive manuals and consult seed-packets, aspiring gardeners will look for inspiration - and to be inspired the look and the feel of a book matters. This salad-growing book seems to be a sort of cross-over in that new gardeners and dreamers thinking about what salads they might grow may be surprised and delighted to find out that cucumbers and peppers come in a variety of shapes and sizes, and middle-gardeners may be inspired to try out some of the recommended varieties. Both groups might find the crisp description of Cucumber Mosaic Virus helpful.

"This aphid-borne disease causes mottled, yellowed and distorted leaves; plants may become stunted and die. Remove and destroy infected plants and where possible control aphids. Varieties with a degree of resistance are becoming available."

Here we go with Red Spider Mite:

"Cucumbers grown under cover are very susceptible. Use biological control as soon as any signs of attack are noticed."

Elegant and informative, engaging and somehow inspiring. It makes me think 'Yes, I would like to know more about this.'

There's loads of the usual information: design, water retention, frames, a little bit of cooking. But rather than feeling these have been stuck in by format or padding, there's the sense that it's an all-in-one book . . . that if you want to grow salads you can put this on your shelf as a pleasure and a reference.

Shelf - yes. Here's something that matters. I don't know what the average shelf-life of a picture-book is. There are wonderful books about gardens that take a lot of space and I don't know whether people treasure them for life or give them to charity shops when their novelty has worn off. Some books do need to be tall; some pictures, some diagrams, need space to make sense. But the problem with this is that most shelves don't accommodate tall books. I have had bookcases made to measure. One was made precisely to contain the tallest book I happened to own at the time. But I'd say this is unusual. Most people buy book-cases 'off the shelf' as it were; and pre-prepared bookshelves are designed more for paperbacks than tomes. One of the maddening things in life is when a book doesn't warrant a place in the 'tall book' space but doesn't quite fit in the 'ordinary' space either. This one is thick (about an inch and a quarter?) but isn't too tall for an ordinary shelf. It's a work-person-like thing.

The paper is lovely. And the pictures are - well, fantastic. There are masses of simple and elegant drawings (or maybe they are photos made to look like drawings) along with enough photographs to give it a more real-life appeal. And there are necessary diagrams. It has a substantial index (good) a list of suppliers (not sure about that - it's bound to be a bit biased) and a year-round 'Saladini Chart'. Saladini (this is new to me) is to do with creating a salad with leafy bulk, sharp flavours, interesting colours and interesting textures. So if you want your salads like this it's useful to have sowing dates so everything can be kept in balance. BUT (here's my one criticism) - the writing in the chart is small (even when wearing my old glasses) and pale; the lines are close together and the colours confusing. One criticism isn't bad though?

I haven't read everything. But I have dipped in and out enough to think this is a 'keeping' book. It's lovely to hold, fits on an ordinary shelf, has beautiful illustrations, loads of information and will be handy for starters and middlers alike. (I reckon.) I took it on holiday with me. I'll have to learn to stop carrying it around. Yea. This is a good one.

The Salad Garden by Joy Larkcom

(Revised and Updated)

Frances Lincoln

£16:99

(Sent from the Quarto Group for review)

Will be published on 4th May 2017

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THE DAY I LOST MY NERVE

On the tops of the cliffs at Burton Bradstock there are sheep fields with dry stone walls.

This morning I emailed a friend to say I was about to walk beside the Broadchurch cliffs near Burton Bradstock.

Quick fire he replied; he'd be frightened to go to the Broadchurch Cliffs but for someone living in Midsommer it would probably feel like a holiday.

Explanations.

The cliffs along the short stretch of Dorset Coast between Burton Bradstock and West Bay are integral to the plot of the television drama 'Broadchurch'. They loom over it. They set the atmosphere.

In the first series a boy's body is found beneath them. (Not a spoiler - the start of the story.) I'm not sure what happened in the second series because it was all a bit of a blur - so very much overloaded with events and surprises it's forgettable; all but the scenery. - the scenery can never be ignored. We're into the third and final series now. It's about rape. It's not cheerful TV. The music is drone. It never lets up. The action is slow. Little happens. But it's well plotted and well acted so each hour-long episode flies as fast as twenty minutes. (Come to think of it, there are three advert breaks in each so it probably is only twenty minutes.)

Midsommer Murders is a long-running detective series set in rural Oxfordshire. There are so many people murdered in every episode it's a standing joke there's anyone left to kill. For the residents of Midsommer, one dead boy is nothing. (They are different genres.)

That's all fiction.

What is not fiction is that these cliffs are terrifying.

They are so terrifying I didn't take any photos.

I didn't walk beside them.

I didn't walk beneath them.

I ran away.

The sea was magnificent.

The waves were enormous.

The roar was exciting.

There was a small crowd of people waiting for the tide to turn so there would be enough safe space between cliffs and water wide enough to pass through safely.

I was terrified. It wasn't just that the cliffs might crumble (which they might) . . . I couldn't stand the feeling of being loomed over. Nature-bloggers aren't supposed to scream inside and flee from their subject matter. But these cliffs are big and red and cracked and gold and they ripple like tall curtains from sky to beach.

I don't like them.
(Shame you can't see them!)

Fortunately, cliffs have grassy tops as well as pebbly bottoms so I walked along up high instead - where there were gulls and fulmars and larks and crows and sunshine and drizzle.

Of course these tops are the earth and rocks which would fall to the beach if the cliffs were to crack, so the choice was not between living and dying but between being crushed by hundreds of tons of rubble or being part of the rubble hurtling down. But light is good. And it's reassuring to imagine one might be able to leap fast enough to cross an unfolding chasm and run inland if necessary. (Through the sheep-field.)

I didn't walk far. When I reached the mouth of the River Bride, I turned back. Rain threatened. 

If I could have turned it into a sunny day for you, I would have.

The River Bride is a pretty little river - and pretty creepy too. Here, as it fights its way into the sea, it carves the most extraordinary shapes. (Its birth at Little Bredy, six miles inland, is the setting for the first Broadchurch rape.)

Dorset is a weird county. It's one of the most beautiful places on earth yet the fiction it inspires is cruel.

Take Thomas Hardy. He wasn't exactly a barrel of laughs.

Mayor of Casterbridge - a drunken man sells his wife to a stranger.

The Trumpet Major - a young woman is sexually harassed by the nephew of the local squire. 

Tess of the d'Urbervilles - a young woman is raped, her baby dies, there are all sorts of complications, she eventually kills her 'seducer' and is executed.

Because I didn't walk below the cliffs I can only show you views from the top!

I had a nice walk though.

P.S. If this were a literary blog I would be wanting to know why there's a cheerful picture of someone hanging out washing on the front cover of Tess of the d'Ubervilles and how come Penguin can describe The Trumpet Major as 'Lyrical and lighthearted'.

The links between literature, landscape and sorrow can be pretty weird.
Humans are weird.
Wouldn't you say?

P.P.S. Readers who've never visited these cliffs may be disappointed there's no picture to show what it's like to look up at them. I just say they frighten me because they loom and might fall over. . . . So I suppose I'll have to go back soon and have another bash at being brave. Not brave for long, you understand. Just brave enough to aim my camera at their stark and dark and rippled faces - before running.

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URBAN FLOWERS by CAROLYN DUNSTER

Because I can't easily take my own photos at present, I've posted
some of my own photos of urban wild plants. They aren't exactly relevant because
the book reviewed here is about urban gardens rather than urban plants - but
I specially admire wild plants which grow in towns so I thought I'd
put some here!
And because, as you'll see at the end, I might decide it's my calling in life
to cast dandelion seeds at the feet of city walls. 

I may be moving.

Some readers will already know my next-door neighbours; Esther Montgomery and her family (her husband Ming and their sons, Worthing and Didcott). They are buying a house bang in the middle of Halifax (Yorkshire; not Nova Scotia!) and have asked if I would like to go too and live in a little flat that has been carved into the attic. This is why I was visiting Halifax last autumn . . . to take a look at the town and the house . . . and things like that.

Nothing is settled They are still checking whether all the beams are in place so it doesn't fall down, and that the roof is not so dilapidated they can't afford to mend it. But hopefully . . .

A bleak urban landscape where
wild plants may grow.
(Not in the book.)

If we do move there, it will be a massive change. The south coast of Dorset is, without question, one of the most beautiful places in the world: huge views of deep-blue seas, warm sunshine, dramatic cliffs, sharp storms with raging waves. Skeletons here are Jurassic, not collapsed mills.

So . . . when I received the book 'Urban Flowers' (Carolyn Dunster and Jason Ingram. Published by Frances Lincoln) for review - I read it with Esther in mind. She could have chosen a house in the country if she'd wanted. Then she would have had somewhere to live and a large garden. But she decided on a back-to-back surrounded by enterprise parks and warehouses - with no garden except a few paving slabs at the front. (She seems to think theatres are worth the trade off - especially as there may be the chance of an allotment not far away.)

Whenever I start a book, I flick through its pages first, look at the pictures, check the contents and see what kind of index it has at the back . . . . and try to gauge who the author wrote it for. Could it be for Esther and people like her? What with her paving slabs and four short walls with iron stumps on - (Second World War reminders of how governments can be . . . not exactly precise in the information they give to the public - see this article about the mystery of the missing railings on the London Parks and Gardens Trust site.)

My next door neighbour (Esther Montgomery) treasures wild flowers in her garden.
Dandelions - May 10th 2015
Not in the book!

Possibly.
Esther's garden used to be beautiful with roses (they pulled the roof off her shed) and jasmine (it smelled like bubble bath) and clematis (it got scraggly) Spanish broom (plastered with blue aphids) . . . until in the end she had to chop so much down it wasn't beautiful any more. It was a casualty of over-reach; a misjudgement of space. And when I look at the rows of potted plants she's been expecting to take to Yorkshire: bay trees, box bushes, lavenders, geraniums, cordylines, mint, balm, oregano . . . I think she's about to make the same mistake again. It was only when the removal firm advised her that plants cost a lot to move because they can't be piled on top of another) she began to concede she might have to leave quite a lot behind.

The book:

Perhaps one of the things we might take from it is that you can't fit Kew Gardens into a backyard. And another is how imprecise the definition of 'small' is - it's entirely subjective - probably related to the last house one lived in, or one's dream home or what the neighbours have got. The subtitle is 'Creating Abundance in a Small City Garden' but I don't think Amelanchier lamackii - which grows to about 39 feet high and 13 feet wide would fit into my idea of 'small'. It's not just a matter of space but of light. I often think about this when I see furniture laid out for inspection in department stores and magazines. As soon as you remember there will be a fourth wall, style flies out the window. Whether you are a plant in a garden, or a human wanting a sofa, you'll not survive unless there's enough light to help you grow.

(Incidentally, in terms of light and air-flow, I'd disagree with Carolyn's idea that you could sensibly pack a cordyline, a fatsia and a couple of other substantial plants onto one small urban balcony, even if you were prepared to obliterate your only hope of a view.)

But setting the definition of 'small' aside, I think it's a good book for saving would-be gardeners from despair when moving into an urban home with very little outdoor space. And it's for people who've never had a garden before too; people who suddenly find themselves with a few spare feet and are wondering what they might put in it apart from wheelie bins.

Not in the book.

- Introduce wheelie bins and the answer is probably 'nothing'. I have it in for wheelie bins. Since someone hit on the idea of fooling people into thinking it's 'ecological' to fill the world with these grotesqueries, properly 'small' town gardens have all but been abolished.

Books like this, I have noticed, fall into three sections of varying usefulness - a clear start, a list in the middle (which might be useful or might not) and fripperies at the end. So it is with this one.

The first part of this book really grabs the attention and gets one thinking. Sometimes these thoughts are of good things - like getting plants to grow in small cracks in walls. Sometimes not so good - like growing parsley in old pineapple tins. Even the illustration in the book shows some parsley looking as if it would prefer to be elsewhere.

The middle section is divided usefully into colours and types of plants. (Admittedly with bits of silliness thrown in. Well, I think it's silly to grow geraniums upside down.) Novices are offered answers to questions like 'what is a bulb?' and there are specific plant recommendations - useful for middling gardeners and those struggling with 'downsizing'.

The end bit is, mercifully, short. How to prolong the life of cut flowers is handy. But making a wreath from apples and blackberries is not. Brambles may find their way onto wasteland from time to time but blackberries don't otherwise tend to grow in towns. Certainly one wouldn't want a bramble patch in a small garden even if one could rise to an espaliered apple. And two pages on baking with petals is quite enough. (I tried crystallising violets once and ended up with a small, sweet, soggy compost heap stuck to a piece of grease-proof paper.)

Not in the book!

What do I think after reading the book? My conclusion is that if just one light and airy and feathery bamboo is all that can reasonably be fitted into a small space - let it be so. And if you have a bit more space than a gate and a step - use it and use it well but don't over-fill. You can be bright and cheerful or stark and elegant but planning is essential if you'd prefer to avoid disease and clutter. This applies to all small gardens - even back gardens where there's room for a table, a couple of chairs and a water 'feature'.

For my own part, I do suspect some of the plantings are a bit dense. And I don't take all ideas seriously. Nasturtiums don't grow gracefully - though I love them - and I'm wary when books say things like coffee grounds 'are said' to act as deterrents to slugs. ''Said to' isn't enough.

Another thing I've decided is that buying plants in pots, sticking them in the garden for a while, then chucking them away . . .  is not necessarily a bad idea. I can hear gasps of horror so I must stress this is me with a new conviction - not necessarily that of the author. People who live in cities and have ultra-small gardens can't always be gardening snobs. For instance, on p.161 there's a display of snowdrops and hyacinths (do hyacinths really need to be staked?) and candles and things, a table, a chair a lamp . . It all looks very pretty but where will you put all this stuff until you want it again next year? Will these plants ever come up again? Un-established snowdrops are certainly a bit iffy second time round.

Not in the book! (But there can never be too many dandelions to cheer a page!)

So, in Desert Island style . .  of the books I've reviewed, which will I take to Halifax? (If I go.)

This book about small gardens will be one.

Leah Lindeertz' book about allotments another.
Possibly last week's book '101 Gardening Hacks' by Shawna Coronado because I'd like to stay inspired about compost. (But I'm not sure.)

And maybe the 'Happy Home Outside' (by Charlotte Hedeman Gueniau) because it cheers me up and makes me laugh. Or perhaps I'd regretfully leave that behind.  It's one thing to joke about filling one's garden with cushions and carpets and outside cinemas. It's another to imagine not having a garden big enough to not put them in. Already I can feel tears stinging.

Do I want to live in a city? Perhaps. Perhaps not.

But if I do, I'll take a bit of hedgerow with me and sow dandelions all along the streets - at the foot of as many walls as I can. There are plenty of walls. And plenty of pollution. And plenty of dust. So maybe dandelions would turn their noses up. I hope they wouldn't though. Some are tough.

'Urban Flowers - Creating Abundance in a Small City Garden' - Frances Lincoln - £20 - Sent for review in March but not to be published till April 6th 2017.

* * *

Gosh! That's ages away yet. Enough time for Frances Lincoln (are you listening dear Frances Lincoln?) to commission me to write a book about Street Plants! You know - the wild kinds.

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101 ORGANIC GARDENING HACKS - A REVIEW

This picture came with an email before the book arrived.
Maybe one day I'll take pictures of what's inside!

Shall I tell you my woes? My camera isn't mended. I've smashed my phone (I fell over) and the speaker I dance around the house to got knocked off its bookcase so the music it spouts sounds tinny.

Right. Having got that out of my system . . . there's a book I was sent ages ago for reviewing and I've been meaning to tell you about it ever since and would have done if I hadn't been feeling so very bolshy about not being able to take photos of it.

It's 101 Organic Gardening Hacks by 

Shawna Coronado.

Cool Springs Press Minnesota.

(Minnesota!)

I like it. (I'll say that fast before you think I'm about to be hyper-critical as usual.)

But before I enthuse, I'll mentions a few 'buts' about the title. It's probably the English / American thing. To me a 'hack' is negative - 'old hack', 'hacking into a computer', 'hacking a horse' (whatever that means) 'hacks in fingers' during cold weather or after doing too much washing up; and taxis. (Hackney cabs.) Computer hackers have been getting a better press recently. 'Hacking' in computersese seems not so much to mean 'breaking in' or 'cheating' but going straight to the point with skill and disregard for convention. Something like that.

'Organic' confused me too. It's not really about organic gardening but it's a book about gardening by someone who happens to do organic gardening. In other words, it's practical rather than proselytising. You wouldn't need to be an organic gardener to find it useful.

Getting there!

The '101' bit.

The book has wonderful advice but there's also what I would call 'padding'. '101' is probably a number publishers (?) like . . .  '37' or '93' wouldn't have the same zing. And by padding I mean things like how to renovate a chandelier so you can hang it in your garden . . . or disguising your shed by putting screens and metal gates round it (what's wrong with garden sheds? I like garden sheds!) . . . or how to decorate your fence by sticking spades on it.

And at the risk of spending all the review space on the title, 'hacks' makes it sound as if the 101 ideas are easy - like growing carrots in a wellington boots. You know the kind of thing.

The cover's very jaunty and the insides are attractively displayed and widely spread - so it looks as if we can flick through and imagine gardening's a doddle. (A popular theme on the gardening shelf.)

So why do I like this book?

It doesn't go for the 'doddle'.

The big deal thing which won me over was that the first 22 'hacks' are solidly about soil and composting. (I'll miss the bits I found irritating in the introduction.) And while it all sounds fun - like making a muddy mixture with earth and tipping in vinegar or baking soda to measure the ph of soil by seeing if it bubbles (waaaaaaaaay!) . . . it's the first book to make me wish I had an allotment - and that the work involved would be properly serious. All of a sudden I want to experiment with making compost. I'm not sure I'd bother with growing veg. - I'd just spend my days making compost in different ways. Shawna does happen to suggest coffee grounds are useful. Maybe they are but I'm a dubious. In my hands they go white and furry. But my hands are not her hands! Clearly. And I'm not sure she mentions what kind of worms you should use. Ordinary earth worms wouldn't be interested. (If I were a good reviewer I'd re-read it to find out but I'm not going to.) Never mind - the thing is . . . all of a sudden, I'd like to go into compost production. (Can you really buy worm casts at garden centres?)

This is the only picture which has come from my camera in ages so I'll use it.
I've got a grump about notices like these.
What if motorways had signs which pointed just to 'roads' in every direction.

It's definitely an American book and inclines to hot weather gardening. Cacti don't like Dorset even though it's hot compared with other parts of the British Isles. And succulents are expensive. I don't need to know how to attract hummingbirds (however much I'd like to) and don't think Japanese Beetles cause much of a problem in the UK. (Though one day they might so perhaps it's good to have this book on hand in case they do.) I can't find bee-preservers in our local gardening centre (or even on Amazon) but that's no matter; finding a way to give bees access to water without risking they'll drown is worth thinking about.

Apart from some things (like edging a path with old wine bottles) I think it's a very respectful book. Gardening may be fun but it's not 'a laugh' in the sense of 'anything goes'. It's a sensible mixture of different kinds of information.The easy-to-make garden bench looks ok. And the suggestion that we should try deep-planting tomatoes is interesting - especially when accompanied, as it is, by an explanation about different types of tomatoes. (I didn't know there are 'determinate' and 'indeterminate' ones. Did you?)

And there are a few 'tips' of the kind which are obvious once you've thought of them - like storing hoses in figures of eight to stop them kinking while stored away . . . or using flour on the earth to mark out garden designs before planting.

Yup. I'd recommend it.

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P.S. I like the instruction that you shouldn't drink tea made from manure.

And I like it that arthritis gets a nod,

And that it's the first gardening book I've read with bison in it.

TAKE SIXTEEN EGGS AND A SLEDGEHAMMER

In my family, when I was growing up, we had a saying 'Take sixteen eggs'. It meant anything which, while desirable in itself, was in-excess of our, or anyone else's, needs; a reference to Mrs Beeton's cookery.

* * *

This post is about a book I've been sent to review.

'Build a Better Vegetable Garden

30 DIY Projects to Improve Your Harvest'. 

It's by Joyce Russell with photographs by Ben Russell.

Published by Frances Lincoln.
Publication date - 5th January 2017
£16.99

From a 1903 version of Mrs Beeton's Cookery Book.

If you've been reading Loose and Leafy for a while, you will probably have noticed that I tend to be a bit cynical about books I review. When it comes to gardening my thought is that you only need one book. This book, in my narrow-minded opinion, would have information about seasons - when to sow and when to reap - rotation, pruning, a bit about composting, a bit about digging, a large section on pests and friendly insects (instars included). Beyond that, I'd write in big letters - READ THE PACKET and TAKE NOTE OF THE LABEL. That's it. You need nothing more. (If you want to grow cacti on windowsills . . . well . . . . )

Despite this, I get real joy from books recommending you take cushions from your house and put them in the garden, or that reckon you'll have the time and wealth to build beautiful paths and sheds on your allotment before spending only half an hour each day on the veg.. I like pictures. I like absurdity.

But I don't review all the books I'm sent. 'Sorry,' I say to the kind promoter. ' Sorry, I really can't recommend this'. (One of these rejects included a garden so boring it has now been completely ripped out and completely re-designed and completely re-planted . . . so I feel my judgement on that one has been justified!)

So . . . I'm about to tell you of a book so peculiar I really and truly have lain awake in the night puzzling about who would read it. It's not for me. I doubt it's for you. So what is it for? None the less, I've not put it aside so . . . there must be something which attracts . . .

Back to the sixteen eggs.

It surprises me that tinned food was in the shops in 1903
- let alone tinned oysters!
If given the choice of simple meals I'd rather eat baked beans on toast.

One of the Mrs Beeton cookery books I have at home was published in 1903 - an era in which people of modest means were trying to be less modest in what they cooked; and they wanted to present themselves to the world as wealthier and more sophisticated than they really were. So the tone is confidential. It tries to show how one person in a kitchen can provide a meal which would previously have needed several staff to prepare. And although it advises how to truss snipe and serve a calf's head, it also gives a recipe for 'cheap gravy'. Tinned pineapples and peas figure in lists of ingredients.

At the front, someone has handwritten a menu for Christmas Dinner dated 1925. Then at the top of a list of meals for Boxing Day, low and behold, they've written 'thirteen fresh eggs'. (See at the top of this post.)

Now to the book about how to 'Build a Better Vegetable Garden'. (Using wood.)

Heavy duty protection for carrots.

The 'recipes' here are as mind boggling as calf's heads and, on the whole, also in excess of what most people would want or need. I've turned it around in my own head, over and over - would anyone really take time to build a huge and heavy wooden fort in which to protect carrots from carrot flies descending from the sky instead of leaping sideways? How would I get the carrots out? Where would I put it in the winter? Who would help me cart it around the place. Would its benefits outweigh its challenges?

A way to grow beans,

Then there's the hinged construction for growing beans up. Poles can be a bit awkward to tie into lines or wig-wams . . . but it doesn't really take that long if you only need a few . .  and it's very satisfying when they're all neatly in place . . . wouldn't a wooden frame which looks like a clothes airer not fly away in our mid-summer storms?

And I seriously doubt that many children are likely to be gripped for very long by seeing the legs of 'salad trays' standing in wellington boots filled with 'slug repellent material'. (Interesting concept that; 'slug repellent material'.)

And when it comes to Raspberry Supports - it's not 'take sixteen eggs' but 'make holes in the ground with a crowbar' and 'use a sledgehammer to knock the posts in place'. (I think Mrs Beeton would have recommended employing a local professional and pretending you'd done it yourself.)

And in terms of health and safety . . . I don't think using a power-tool to drive screws downwards into the sides of frames supported only by hand is sensible. Nor using the lawn as a work bench. Stones are mysterious creatures. You think you've cleared them but they wriggle underground till they're back exactly where you don't want them; and if they've taken residence right under your whirring power drill . . trouble!

Some of the tools recommended in the 'Build a Better Garden' book.

I've used a power drill, a jigsaw and various other conventional saws and planes . . . and from frustrating experience I know woods wobble and wander; and that while clamps are useful, in my non-expert opinion we can all do with a good vice when dealing with large planks of wood.  I've gone through decades of being an amateur and you really shouldn't even think of letting me near projects like these without a sturdy work bench. And everyone using this book will need a big budget. Sledgehammers, crowbars, staple guns, saws, hammers and spirit levels are on the shopping list. (You should see the big box she has of drill bits and power screwdrivers and things and - oh my goodness, I hadn't noticed this till now, she even has a circular saw!)

Some of the kitchen tools recommended
for home cooking in 1903.

So . . . why am I telling you about this book when it could be dangerous in the hands of a ham-fisted amateur; and when there's not much point in buying it if you're a professional because you'll know it all already? I enjoy a bit of digging now and then, and I'd like to live in a big house with a big and beautiful garden and space to store carrot forts, but I'm unconvinced everything here is truly useful.

(To some degree, it's a matter of taste too. I love cold frames but beyond that I like an uncluttered atmosphere in vegetable gardens.)

Back to the question then - why am I writing about this book? And, for that matter, why did I lie in bed wondering why I'd decided I would do so?

This is the kind of thing I admire but can never achieve.
Perfect and beautiful symmetry.

I think it's because I'm not a mathematician. I'm a disorganised muddler. And to be a carpenter you have to be incredibly good at making very precise angles. Precise angles are beyond me. So I admire them; and look at the perfectly placed holes for screws and am struck down by their beauty in round-ness and symmetry. And I read the simple instruction that the sides of a box should reach down beside its base, not be perched upon it . . . and I think 'wow, I would never have thought of that yet I can see clearly now why it should be thus'. And I look at the power drill and admire the writer who is bound to use it well; in contrast with me; for my drill turns itself dangerously on whenever I pick it up. (Because I've never been strong enough to grasp the handle without pressing the 'go' button by mistake.)

So, this book is, I've decided, a kind of philosophy of wonder . . . of how can anyone be this precise and clever? . . . and why would anyone want these things? . . . and would I buy all this equipment unless I wanted a career in carrot-fort construction?  . . . and why did the 1925 list-maker think it necessary to pencil into the front of her Mrs Beeton cookery book that her family would be subsisting on a relentless diet of potatoes, cold ham, cheese and swedes once Christmas Day was over?

For the thirteen fresh eggs which figure at the top of 'what's needed for Boxing Day' vanish as soon as they're mentioned. So here's another context in which we can say 'take sixteen eggs'. The strange desire for such superfluities surfaces when, although we don't specially want to be mega-rich, we'd wistfully like to have a little more than we have just at present. So we write 'take sixteen eggs' before knuckling down and trying to pretend, as that list maker did, that serving potato mashed is enough of a variation to make a plain diet festively exciting. And we write 'work bench' on our Father Christmas list before sticking bean poles in the ground as usual.

. . . except . . . except . . . I also have a cookery book which advises

 how to cook spinach . . . 

and ignoring all other recipes in it, it's worth the price for that alone . . .

 And for some of us 

having it explained how to make a wooden raised bed 

that doesn't wobble would be 

. . . pretty handy . . . hm.

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BOOK REVIEW: HAPPY HOME OUTSIDE BY CHARLOTTE HEDEMAN GUENIAU

I've only ever kept one book beside my bed before and that was a prayer book. When life got tough I would read the psalms. They are rare, those places and books one can go to knowing someone else understands the trauma life can bring, the despair, the loneliness . . . and can express is so well one can experience solidarity down the millennia.

So . . . that I keep one of the books sent for review beside my bed may seem horribly trivial in comparison. But I do now keep this book beside my bed - because it makes me laugh. And being made to laugh, to be truly happy, is as important as to be 'understood' or to appreciate poetry. (And the psalms are mega-poetry.)

It's . . . oh, this is so embarrassing given the build-up . . . the book is  'Happy Home Outside - Everyday Magic for Outdoor Life' by Charlotte Hedeman Guéniau - but it's so desperately funny that if ever I feel a little 'down' I pick it up and laugh. And it's even more astonishing than that. When worries seem overwhelming (and, sometimes, they do) - I pick it up then too - and laugh. It hasn't failed me yet. I go to favourite pages - and laugh. And I drive friends up the wall by opening it randomly and reading out whatever is there so they can laugh too.

It's a kind of Blue Peter for the wealthy. It's for people who have family, friends or servants (?!) who will carry furniture and carpets from the house, place them in the garden and bring them back in again later. It's for people who just happen to have brightly coloured poles lying around the place so they can make wigwams - upon which they can hang cheerful little rucksacks (pp158-9). Or easy access to pallets to turn into swings (p.102). And big gardens where summer houses can be knocked up and filled with cushions. And houses big enough to project films on . . . and friends who just happen to be expert enough to set up sound systems for your outside cinema (p.155).

And cushions. Cushions everywhere! Which is the nub of it really. For what this boils down to is, in effect, an extended advert for 'Rice' - a chain of shops which sells cushions. So cushions abound. Great piles of them . . . 

It's a dream world. The colours are fantastic - as are the ideas . . . Decorate your trees with shopping bags or lampshades . . . Fix spoons into your fly screens (p.23). Tape slogans like 'Yess!' to boxes and consider them to be uplifting thoughts (p.71). Have a pink hose (p31).

It's a world where everything is approached sideways. We are shown how to make curtains for camper-vans by hanging tea-towels on string. Fine. Charlotte's husband gave her a camping van for a wedding present. Well, that's the real issue isn't it? How to find someone who will fall into your arms and give you a camper-van.

And there's a spiritual side . . . Here's one of my favourite quotes.

"To be creative together is almost like meditating. When you focus on crafting you are together in a different way - Sometimes you chat and talk, other moments you enjoy silently."

So what does she suggest you do to reach this measure of companionable stillness? . . . Draw faces on conkers! My own face is breaking into the biggest grin possible while I tell you this. It's brilliant. Unfailing hilarity.

I am not mocking. Most certainly I am not. And I'm not joking about this book being beside my bed. I'm speaking the complete truth when I say it cheers me up and makes me smile. Indeed I'm sure this will have been the intention behind the book - simple and unadulterated fun. (Fun, that is, and buying cushions!) I expect some who buy it will recreate some of the ideas. Even I may be inspired to make tea in a pot on occasions, and carry it into the garden on a tray instead of bunging mugs in the general direction of friends and getting them to carry them out for themselves. Or I might risk pegging plastic mugs on wires to see what they make of it (p.148). But I doubt I'll 'make my heart sing' by putting on boxing gloves (p170) or waste much time painting croquet mallets pastel colours.

Somewhere around the house I have Kaffe Fasset's book 'Glorious Colour - Sources of Inspiration for Knitting and Needlepoint'; a book of wonderfully colourful objects all crammed in and arranged to take one's breath away. I don't know how many people have been inspired to churn out cushions and garments because of it - but I bet there are masses who've carried it home, gazed at its glories and treasured it regardless of their domestic or creative abilities.

I've looked through some other reviews of this one. Some take it as a serious selection of ideas to be followed through. Some think it a bit weak and rushed out - or a coffee table book or . . . But I think it's a right ole laugh and having a right ole laugh is so important to all of our health I say - go and buy it. I don't know how successful it's been as a publication. It's been out for several months and hasn't one review on the UK Amazon. But I like it.

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Happy Home Outside - Everyday Magic for Outdoor Life - published by Jaqui Small and sent me to review by Quarto Books.

The photo credits are to Skovdal&Skovdal. With books like this . .  (they are picture books really, aren't they?) those who take the pictures should be right up there on the front cover in BIG letters.

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RHS: THE HALF-HOUR ALLOTMENT ( LIA LEENDERTZ) - A REVIEW

To say you can give merely half-an-hour a day to an allotment is tempting but is it possible? No.

The Half-Hour Allotment was first published in 2006.
This revised edition was released in October 2015

I'm treading on icy ground here. Lia Leendertz is a gardening journalist and has an allotment. I'm just me and I don't have an allotment. But by the end of the first chapter I was exhausted and (in my imagination) broke. Before any time at all I'd got the idea that setting up an allotment is expensive and time consuming. Right on the second page to the introduction Lia herself suggests 'half-an-hour' might might be re-interpreted to mean 'two hour-and-a-quarter visits over two days'. She also says the idea of half-hour allotmenteering was developed by someone called Will Sibley so I spent a while wondering why he hadn't written the book himself, or in collaboration.

And I'm just about to confuse you. My test for whether I like or value a book is whether I want to keep a book after reviewing it or whether I'd like to donate it to my local horticultural society. I'm keeping this. Why? It's fun. Well written. And engaging. And there aren't many gardening books I can happily read from beginning to end without abandoning them in favour of dipping. But I did this.

Here's the wildly frustrating thing though. By the end of the first chapter I'd chosen a good allotment (some hope!) established a shed, laid a path and built raised beds - some of them about waist high to save my bad back. Lia does suggest people might like to work in pairs to take account of differing ages, strengths and skills. I'd say you'd need a team of people. There would need to be a car and a lot of spare cash. The allotment would have to be on a route travelled every day or be very close to home. As I read through the book I found I might need old pallets (where would I get them?) which I'd need to nail together. (How would I do that?) And that if I don't have access to logs, I could use a piece of corrugated iron (for slow-worms to creep under). I don't know about you but I'd find it easier to buy logs than rummage around for an old piece of corrugated iron. I might like to pin pieces of card to the ground with large stones. (To suppress weeds.) That sounds ok until you start looking for stones large enough. The earth may seem full of them while you're trying to dig but there are rarely many small rocks. And if I'm to protect potatoes as they begin to grow where will I find a stash of cabbage leaves to cover them with? (Especially at that time of year.) (And will they stay put?) And a garden shredder is not something one is likely to have about one's person.

I remember as a student reading that an easy, free and attractive bookcase could be made from some old bricks and couple of planks. Sounds good until you go looking for old bricks and abandoned planks.

Who, I am asking myself, is this book for?

For young professionals with spare cash who like the idea of having an allotment but don't necessarily need it? With friends who'd like to come and help them out in return for a taste of the good life and a glass of wine? This, of course, could be you!

And people prepared blindly to discount 'preparation' time. It's a bit like buying a book called 'Five Minute Recipes' only to discover you will need to spend hours traipsing around in search of unusual ingredients and have a fridge or freezer already stocked with sauces 'made earlier'. 'Five minutes' turns out to mean several days. 

Then I wondered if it might be for people who are thinking of having an allotment next year, even the year after. People who might need to be put off for a bit until they have thought through the kind of challenges they will meet and have worked out how and whether they can overcome them.

I doubt any but those with well established allotments are likely to benefit from the half-hour advice. (Which is pretty thin: don't hang around talking to other people or standing there wondering what to do, have your work planned in advance . . . )

But allotmenteers who have already got their sheds and paths and lawnmowers and compost . . . have already learnt that blackflies like to eat broad bean plants  . . . and who are not challenged by the idea that they might simultaneously rotate the planting of roots and alliums and mix spring onions in with the carrots . . . I doubt these gardeners will need the kind of advice about growing things offered in this book. (Though it's often helpful to have a revision lesson. You go 'Oh, I'd forgotten that! or 'Hmm. Here's another angle.')

In the end I decided that as well as for people with money to sling at a hobby, it's for re-starters; people who had an allotment in the past but gave up; people who've had time to think about it and would like another go; people who have already experienced problems with their gardening so they know what they are looking for in the way of solutions. It isn't I reckon, for people who are right at the beginning of their growing career - for all that it gives advice on what allotment to choose. (Some hope that - having a choice!)

And the final problem - the pictures. The pictures are alluring. They are of runner beans growing in straight rows. (The text doesn't mention that parallel rows aren't necessarily easy to create or that bamboo poles can be a pain - one end won't go in the ground properly, the other wobbles around on the green string you are trying to tie it to the others with. It takes more than ten minutes to get the hang of it, let along make a strong, neat row.) There are smart fences and brand new trowels. There are perfect apples, greenhouses and polytunnels. A beautiful scarecrow. (How long does it take to make a scarecrow? Ages!) I've found this with a lot of books. It's not an uncommon problem; this disjunction between photos and text. There we are reading about struggling to get things right while being blasted by humiliating perfection. (They are lovely though.)

So if you are an indifferent allotmenteer who would genuinely like to do better . . . would I recommend this book to you? Well yes. Yes, I would. I find it inspiring. If I were in a position to have another go at having an allotment, (I've done it you know) I'd probably be phoning the council right now, asking to have my name put on the list instead of writing this review. (I'll gloss over the idea that brambles can be cut back and rooted out in the blink of a half-hour eye. I'd need a day on them alone if they'd encroached very far.)

The sub-title is 'Timely Tips For The Most Productive Plot Ever' - which is rather hopeful (!) but a clearer indication of what the book's about. And I'd add to that 'With Handy Hints on How to Get on With Your Allotment Neighbours'. (A trickier task than anyone who's not had an allotment might think!)

I'm a sucker for charts and tables. I'd like it if there were charts to show when to do what rather than relying on the reader to make notes as they go through the book.

And it would be amusing (says she meanly!) to have a timetable to show how you can do all this in half hour slots broken up into ten minute pieces.

Now I'll go and see what other reviewers have said. They'll probably all be saying how easy it is to set up and run an allotment on two and a half hours a week - and I'll feel stupid. But I'll risk it though. Here I go. Press 'Publish'!

(The Half-Hour Gardener is published by Frances Lincoln in collaboration with the Royal Horticulture Society. 

READER OFFER!

To order 'RHS: The Half Hour Allotment' at the discounted price of £13:99 including p&p* (RRP £16:99) telephone 01903 828 503 or email mailorders@lbsltd.co.uk and quote the offer code APG378. 

*UK only. If ordering from overseas, please add £2:50

* * *

AND FOR ANOTHER APPROACH TO GROWING FRUIT AND VEG

watch this little film for children

'Hey Duggee and the Food Growing Badge'

It's WONDERFUL.

(It's sometimes only available in Australia so the link may not work

but try it - you will like if if you get through but the link works at the time of posting.)