The Book of Garden Design by John Brookes has a lot of information you won't find in most design books intended for the homeowner. It may be out of print, but you can buy used copies online. Some of the plants he describes are only hardy to zone 7, as he is gardening in the UK, but there are also many that will do well in colder zones. His explanations of using a pattern or grid for layout, mass and scale, layering, and relating a design to the house are very useful. It doesn't tell you how to make compost or build anything, but there are a million books that cover those topics. There are many others that you can use for inspiration rather than an explanation of how to put a design together. Buying used books is a good way to put together a library without spending so much that you feel bad about the occasional dud.

Guide to CO Wildflowers (vol 2) for Mountains by G.K. Guennel(also has a companion book for wildflower hikes that is great. If still in print, Alpine Wildflowers of the Rocky Mountains (Joseph Duft and Robert Moseley

"Lynxe, The Tudors stayed true to form on Henry's appearance until his final years. He was a ver fit and athletic King. His good looks were known throughout Europe." That's true only if you define "final years" as the last 15 or so. He was obese at the time that Catherine Howard entered the picture, but you wouldn't know it from watching the show. Actually, if the show were accurate, he'd have started gaining observable weight at the time of Anne Boleyn's execution and his marriage to Jane Seymour. Aside from physical changes (including his unhealed leg ulcer, which was disgusting but I think was mentioned or alluded to only a few times in the show, and which had to be drained regularly, not just once), he also had deteriorated mentally, so much so that some researchers considered him mad by the end. Actually again, his personality was so "split," and for so long, that my understanding is that some contemporary chroniclers did not know what to make of him. Regardless, I make sure not to miss a single episode! I am a total sucker for those kinds of shows.

Thank you so much for all the recommendations. I'll be traveling a lot soon and I'm sure I'll read a lot of these. I have Aunt Dimity queued up to read, along with the first Ngaio Marsh book. I'll probably try Miss Read next and/or Major Pettigrew's Last Stand. Many of those mentioned I have read. Rhys Bown mysteries, Amelia Peabody mysteries, Georgette Heyer, Mitford books, etc. But it was helpful to have those recommendations because it was lovely to see there are others who enjoyed those books as well. And I will try the audiobook of the Amelia Peabody mysteries because I often fall asleep to an audiobook, so it's helpful to have a good recommendation. I tried A Man Called Ove and I'm sure I'll finish it, but it is unbearably sad to read it right now so I laid it down. I have a friend who has cancer and also a suspicious spot on her liver and she is the light of her husband's life. I want to escape from pain and loss right now. A murder mystery like Agatha Christie writes should be sad, I guess. It's murder, but somehow that doesn't reach out and snatch my heart out like the pain of Ove losing his wife. Another time in my life I would probably have liked A Gentleman in Moscow and A Man Called Ove. So thank you so much to all of you for taking the time to respond. It will be nice to have this thread to check when I finish the stack of books I have now.