Not about historic gardens, but two books I came across recently: Residential Landscape Architecture by James E. Hiss and Norman K. Booth. A Landscape Design course I'm taking uses excerpts from this book to illustrate basic design principles. It describes the problems most commonly found in residential properties, and how to deal with site conditions such as wind, sun, drainage, and how to measure, analyze, and design or re-design a residential landscape, including how to interview clients before doing a design. No pretty pictures, only line-drawings, but a good basic book on design, and a lot of info I hadn't seen in other design books I have. The other is Garden Design: How to Be Your Own Landscape Architect by Robin Williams. It covers a lot of the basics, materials, and design elements, including some nice examples of actual site layouts without getting bogged down with plant selection. It had nice examples of pergola, fence, wall, and paving styles. The examples of symmetrical and asymmetrical formal gardens were especially interesting to me, as I love formal-style gardens and was frequently at a loss when trying to design around existing structures or plants, or a less than symmetrical lot. I particularly enjoyed this one. Jo

I absolutely love using the library's online features! With 3 small children, I either have to make an extra trip down to the library after they are put to bed which doesn't give me much time before the library closes or I have to try and keep them quiet in the upstairs adult section which doesn't usually work very well. Imagine VERY loud voices asking questions like "Why do they have so many computers up here?" "Why do we have to be so quiet?" "When is it time to go hoooome? *whine*" Once I realized how easy it is to do things online, I started using it all the time. I can renew our books online so that I don't have huge late fees. I can put things on hold at our library like popular DVDs or new releases. They are always on hold for someone so it's much easier to get my name on the hold list than it is to find it on the shelf. And of course, the interlibrary loan system is great! I've found so many books using that. Besides the ones I was looking for, I've also found some by using the features "nearby items on shelf" and "find more on these topics". They have a pretty nice setup. Our library also has an ongoing used book, magazine, and CD sale near the front desk. I once found a whole stack of gradening magazines like Garden Gate and Organic Gardening for 25 cents each! And you can check out magazines also. In fact, I just quick bumped over there and put the last 4 issues of Garden Gate on hold (from Waterford library). Oh, and Julie, if you do a search using the words "fine gardening" that magazine is available at Burlington library plus a few others so if you need some reading material this winter but don't want to shell out the money for a magazine that you only read part of, it can be transferred to the Racine library for you. There is also a series called "Fine gardening design guides" that seems to have been put out by the magazine along with a few separate books titled "The Best of Fine Gardening: Perennials", "The Best of Fine Gardening: Shrubs and Trees" and a few others. Does Sturtevant have a library or do you use Racine's? If the bookmobile comes out near you, you have the option of choosing where you want to pick up the items and can switch it to Bookmobile. It's funny, most of the libraries only seem to keep the last 2 years of issues but West Bend has copies of Fine Gardening going back to 1997! I wonder why? Perhaps they have more gardeners in that area or just most storage room. There's a new book by Melinda Myers titled "Month-by-month gardening in Wisconsin : what to do each month to have a beautiful garden all year". I'm going to have to put that on hold. I wonder if they have Birds and Bloom magazine. Well, I'm going to quit bouncing back and forth between websites and just send this before it gets any longer. Kimberly P.S. My library's SHARE program covers these areas: Dodge, Jefferson, Racine, Walworth and Washington Counties. But I'm sure there are similar programs for the other parts of...

I read "Botany of Desire" last summer and found some parts fascinating (apples), and others drawn out & a bit boring (hemp). I learned a lot from it, and though I wouldn't recommend it to a general reading audience, if you are interested in learning about food and like physical science it will probably appeal. I read "Shanghai Girls" this summer and I really enjoyed it. I knew little about Chinese history and culture in the timeframe featured in the book, 1937-'53ish. I learned a lot and found the characters' stories compelling. I began Julia Child's "My Life In France" right before I was hit with an avalanche of stayover guests. Still hoping to finish it before I see "Julie & Julia." The movie might leave the theatres before I do, as more folks are coming for Labor Day weekend. DH & I both read "The Tender Bar" in July, and we both loved it. That was one from last summer's list.. Despite all the rain we had, this didn't turn out to be much of a "reading summer" for us.

Great thread - I've added a few of the books suggested above to my own "to read" list. I just finished reading The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks and couldn't put it down. It was a bit more science than I'm used to in my reading material, but not too difficult to understand. The story is about how the cancer cells taken from the cervix of Henrietta Lacks revolutionized medical research, and how her family, poor African-Americans, came to terms with the cells being taken from their mother upon her death (HeLa cells) - without their knowledge - and were turned into a multi-billion dollar business, even though her own children couldn't afford adequate health care. Here is a link that might be useful: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks