91 Books Like A Garden from a Hundred Packets of Seed

A slightly more left-field choice in some ways since this book, as the title suggests, is a history, rather than a memoir, but it gave me such an uplifting sense of the permanence and longevity of nature, that I felt I had to include it.

It reinforced the sense that the natural world has existed way before we have and will go on long after we’ve disappeared. Just reading about the passion, dedication, and enthusiasm of gardeners down the ages too, provided an instant tonic.

If, like me, you’re a history buff, it’s also full of fascinating insights on how natural spaces down the centuries have acted as the social, romantic, and economic bedrocks of communities; how they’ve supported, reinvigorated, and given sustenance to so many different people over time.

Comforting, entertaining, and informative all at once.

This is perhaps the best-known and most obvious choice illustrating Nature’s healing powers. Mary, an orphaned girl, moves in with an estranged, reclusive uncle on his isolated English estate. Lonely and bereaved, Mary spends her days exploring both the house and extensive gardens, when one day she discovers a secret garden, locked away behind a wall.

This garden, tucked away and neglected for many years, is the key to Mary’s healing. Through quiet deliberation, she begins to bring the garden back to life and, in turn, finds new life in herself. The healing of the uncle is perhaps the most mystical scene in the book for me, brought about by a quiet moment beside a trickling stream, where he has an epiphany of heart healing. I find the book’s mixture of nature and mystery beguiling.

Derek Jarmon was a British avant-garde filmmaker, theater designer, and life-long gardener. In the last decade of his life, he built a new garden at a tiny house by the sea in Kent. Prospect Cottage sits on the shingle expanse overlooking the Dungeness Nuclear Power Station and the English Channel. It was an accidental garden, this arrangement of rocks and driftwood, flowers, and found objects. The book sings. Jarmon’s musings and poems wind through a small volume of 140 pages; there are 150 photographs. It is a book about why we garden, how to live, and how to die.

In 2007 I worked in two gardens in the UK: Rosemoor, a Royal Horticultural Society garden in Devon, and London’s Chelsea Physic Garden. I was smitten by the miniature rock plants, displayed in pots in the gravel bed of Rosemoor’s Alpine House, and set into the odd, antique Pond Rockery at the Physic Garden. Shulman’s glib, tiny book reminds me of those jewel-like plantings. It focuses on the founding father of British alpine gardening, Reginald Farrer, a plant collector, writer, and swashbuckling adventurer. His method for seeding his cliffside garden in the Yorkshire Dales was my favorite episode; he loaded his gun with seeds he had collected in the Himalayas, took aim at the cliff, and pulled the trigger. Note: I haven’t tried this at home.

This is a very slim volume by the Czech novelist, playwright, and essayist who gave us the word “robot” in a play in 1921. In this book, Capek takes readers through a year, month by month, in his backyard garden in Prague. The writing is full of humor, the tone conversational, with observations that resonate with all gardeners–from the fickleness of the weather to the pleasures of reading plant catalogues in the winter. But the true subject of Capek’s musing is the complexity of human nature. For the writer, the garden is a metaphor for what makes us human. It is ultimately a very hopeful book, and Capek ends it with these words: “The right, the best is in front of us. Each successive year will add growth and beauty. Thank God that again we shall be one year farther on!”  

Gardening, whether in a backyard or a hundred-acre orchard, is an audacious attempt to improve on nature, and Smith’s fascinating hybrid of biography, history, and botany brings to life the most audacious of them all. The only biography on my list, I’ve included it because, in an age where we might be forgiven for thinking it takes millions of corporate dollars and genetic engineers to produce a new plant, The Garden of Invention reminds us how one man’s singular determination, patience, and brilliance can change the world. And produce the perfect potato for McDonald’s French fries.

A self-critical and often hysterically funny account of what happens when you plant a garden to be “one with nature” and nature has other ideas. Still my favorite Pollan book (his first!), which is saying a lot. Favorite bit: his journey from “living in harmony” with a resident groundhog to an albeit ill-considered act of firebombing.

Any reading on nature spirits has to include a book or two from the Findhorn community or Dorothy Maclean - one of its founders and plant spirit communicator. I recommend this one as it contains not only insights from many plant devas and landscape devas, but a broad overview of the formation of the Findhorn Community itself - which occurred in direct communication and cocreation with the plant devas themselves. A fascinating and eye-opening read. 

This book has been continuously in print since 1945. That date is not a typo! The fact is that this book speaks across genders, races, and generations with the message of belief in oneself—even when everyone else tells you that you’re wrong. Children accustomed to the brightly colored illustrations in contemporary books may take a while to warm up to this gem, but this classic exploration of patience and the power of positive thinking deserves a shout-out. The garden theme works well for spring reading.

Out for a walk one day in his dreary urban neighbourhood, Liam stumbles upon a patch of dying plants growing around an abandoned railway track. Although he knows nothing about growing things, he can see the plants need a gardener, so he decides to help them. 

The story of what happens to the garden is charming, but what makes this book a favourite of mine is Liam—a little master of equanimity and confidence. Instead of feeling insecure about his lack of gardening experience and knowledge, he sees a need and gets to work. Rather than fretting about his failed attempts, he keeps trying and finds better ways. Liam embodies the power of starting small and caring for one thing at a time.