Cultivating Delight
A Natural History of My Garden
By Diane Ackerman
HarperCollins - October 2001
ISBN: 0060199865 - Hardcover
Nonfiction / Gardening

Reviewed by Brenda Weeaks, MyShelf.Com
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Poet, essayist, and naturalist Diane Ackerman introduces her version of a gardening book. Cultivating Delight is written in first person with a conversational tone. Month by month, Ackerman shares the gardening seasons with her readers. In fact, readers will feel as they've met the author at her garden gate for a long, intimate walk through her personal garden as she shares gardening opinions and stories, including those of friends and family.

Various types of gardens are discussed, along with the choices people make and why. She also goes over what we gardeners hate to experience -mistakes-- whether it's because of Mother Nature or a planting faux pas. Her wisdom boils down to "Hey, it happens." She also touches on the lawn, considering it "a pause" in the garden - a new and interesting insight for me. She attempts to show how personally important gardens are to their gardeners and discusses the animals that come with gardening, suggesting readers to accept them as a part of the natural life.

The author uses Shakespeare, Greek myths, provocative insights and much more as she explains her garden and plants. I can't ever recall comparing my plants with pips and thugs in need of pollinating, but Ackerman expresses gardening in her own unique way. It's a provoking, distinctive look at gardening through the eyes of a poet.

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