That link doesn't work for me, Tony, and I'm not sure I can explain it. Maybe the image of the pages from the book are on the screen, but the text isn't available to my screen reader. I keep coming back to Woodyoak's comments about the original three metaphors in this post's title. She wrote, "Perhaps what metaphor is useful depends on the stage of the gardens development and the particular objective under consideration as well as the mindset of the gardener at the time." Woodyoak, your garden sounds much further along than my own. Which got me thinking about time. There's been a thread here a while back about how to create the look and feel of age in a garden. In other words, artificial aging. The more recent thread about the beautiful ruins of an old stone barn is the real thing. But, some of the design questions still hinge on how you want to tell the story of those stones or what story you choose to tell. I live on an average street, in an average house, in a town that is so average it came in 2nd in the contest to be the "real" Springfield where the Simpsons live. Glaciers dominated this region for a very long time, and then prairies interspersed with thick bands of forest grew here for tens of thousands of years. For just a couple of handfuls of decades European settlers farmed the surface of this land, while a little later first and second generation immigrants mined it. Most of the homeowners within the city limits are required to purchase insurance for mine subsidence. Not always a comforting thought, as this is the region of the new Madrid fault line, famous for relative inactivity, famous for the strongest earthquake ever recorded in the lower 48 states. That's a story that my father, a geologist, liked to tell to get the hairs on the back of our necks to stand on end. He felt downright cheated when I called him a few years back to tell him I'd experienced a tiny little seismic tremor. An elderly friend told us that one of the largest mine heads was located about a three minute walk from my house. In a slightly different direction I can walk 3 or 4 minutes to where the last corn fields were sold three years ago. Now McMansions have sprouted up on their tiny lots. Amili wrote, "But then perhaps the garden is more often meant to be the setting for a good story, the lush and sensuous backdrop, a catalyst, not the author." Which got me to ask myself, "Why have I been going down this road?" Why try to make a garden tell a story? "To celebrate," writes Nandina. And that's what I would attempt to do in telling stories. Not the stories of western expansion, industrialization, or the blanding of life in suburbia. The stories I play with in my mind's eye are celebrations. They help me to dream my garden more clearly when, as now, it sleeps beneath an ice storm. Wellspring

This is what he sent me. I have had this for awhile now, it might be a bit different now. Please follow the next steps to correct the issues on your Pandigital Novel: 1. Plug your reader into your computer using the USB cable. 2\. Locate the "My Computer" icon on your desktop or just "Computer". This can also be found by clicking on the "start" button in the lower left\-hand corner of your screen. 3\. Locate the drive listed as "Removable disk". 4\. This file should have Adobe Digital Editions as the first icon. Delete everything in this file except for Adobe Digital Editions. \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_ Re\-run the firmware update. I have included specific instructions on how to update your Novel: If you should have any questions after following these directions, please do not hesitate to call our customer service phone number at: (800) 715\-5354. 1. Please visit our website on your home computer at www.pandigital.net 2. This will bring you to our home page, on the right\-hand side of the screen you will see a box with the words "Firmware Updates Click here", please click on this box. 3. This will bring you to the next webpage asking you to select your region. For your specific Pandigital Novel please click on the \[American/Canadian\] flag. 4. You have now reached our information page. On this page, please locate the blue lettering that states: "Click here to learn more and to update your Pandigital Novel." 5. This will bring you to the actual update page. Please read over the information on what the latest firmware update can do for you. The additional features that come with this update are something to be excited about and we�re sure you will be too! 6. Please locate the blue text at the bottom of this screen that states: "Click here to run PC Updater Application." 7. At this point if you have a pop\-up blocker in use, you may get a yellow/gold bar that appears at the top of your screen asking if you would like to allow this pop up. Click on "temporarily allow pop\-ups" and refresh the page by hitting the F5 key on your keyboard. If you do not have a pop\-up blocker in use, ignore this step. 8. You will now have a download box appear on your screen asking you if you wish to run or save this program. If you are using Windows XP with IE you will choose the "Run" option. If you are using Windows Vista, please "Save" this file to your desktop. 9. Windows XP: At this point you may have an information box appear that will inform you that the publisher of this program could not be verified and ask if you are sure you would like to run this program�Click "Run" again. The Updater Application will start automatically. Windows Vista: Please double\-click the download icon on your desktop to being running the Updater Application. 10. The Updater Application should now be on your screen. It lists the steps that you will go through to update your Pandigital Novel. Click on the blue text that states "Click here to start the process". 11. At this point, the program will list some steps you will need to do before updating your novel. These steps are: 1. Unplugging any other USB mass storage devices from your computer. These kinds of devices include flash drives, cameras, photo frames etc. Keyboards and mice are not considered storage devices so if you have any of those plugged into your USB ports, they are ok to leave plugged in. 2. Powering your Pandigital Novel with the supplied AC adapter (please ignore this step and just be sure that your Pandigital Novel is fully charged before you attempt the upgrade process). 3. Connect your Pandigital Novel to your computer using the USB cable that was supplied with your device. 4. Power your Pandigital Novel on (your Novel will go into "PC Mode"\- this means that your Novel will be inoperable while connected to your computer). 12. Once you have completed these steps, please click on "Ok" to advance to the next step. 13. The Updater Application will then display a screen and ask you to confirm the details of your device (serial number, model number, etc.). Confirm these details by clicking on the "Confirm" button. 14. You will now begin the download process. (This process can take some time depending on your computer and your internet speed). 15. Once you have finished the download the screen will display that you have successfully downloaded the firmware update. At this point you will see another text box on appear on your screen giving you more instruction. These instructions will include: 1. Removing your Pandigital Novel device from your computer 2. Informing you that your Novel may or may not turn itself off, if it does not turn itself off, please power the Novel completely off by pressing the power button and choosing the "power off" option. 3. Now it will ask you to power your Novel back on in a very specific way. Please press the power and volume up button (located on the top of your device and is the + key) at the same time (not one and then the other, they must be pressed at the same time) for 10 seconds. Please do these steps until you see two lines of white text appear at the top of your screen that states the boot count and firmware version. As soon as you see these lines of text, let go of the power and volume + buttons. This should begin the update process in the form of a blue progress bar appearing at the bottom of the screen that will state things like "verifying update." If you have reached this screen your Novel is now updating properly. If you do not see this screen, please power your device off once more and try the activation process of holding the power and volume + buttons again. Do not be discouraged if this takes a few tries, and be sure you are holding the edge of the power + button; holding it too close to the middle will not activate the update. 4. Once the update is complete, please power off your Pandigital Novel completely, then reconnect the device to your computer using the USB cable and power it on after it is plugged in. 5. Click on "Ok". This will then run a process called a "restore". Once this has finished please disconnect your novel and once more perform the activation process of holding down the power and volume + buttons. You will again get another blue progress bar at the bottom of your screen when done correctly. 16. Congratulations! You have now updated your Pandigital Novel successfully! I have attached a new user manual for your use as the interface of your Novel has now changed to the most recent version. We hope you enjoy your Novel even more now and make use of all of the newest features! Happy Reading!

The best WW II novels I know are by Alan Furst, all the protagonists are unimportant people caught up in the war--usually getting involved with spying in some way or other. The recreation of the period is phenomenal, and the characters compelling, though they might be a trifle too sophisticated for teens. For adults, I also recommend two memoirs, now pretty much forgotten. I ran across reference to them in some other book I was reading a few years ago. One is called The Walls Came Tumbling Down and is by a Dutch woman who was imprisoned as a political prisoner. When the Germans fled the prison camp, she and several friends had to figure out how to get home. Very interesting. The other is Three Came Back (I hope I have the name right.) An American woman, her husband and very small son are trapped in southeast Asia when the war breaks out and survive the war in a Japanese internment camp. Also very good.

I had a link at the top of the comments 'See more comments' and all the missing comments from the 28-17 day gap showed up. I picked up T. Kingfisher's Halcyon Fairy Book mentioned by (I think) Sheri above - Kingfisher's comments had me in stitches several times, and I really liked her own adaptations at the end, especially the Snow White and Bluebeard adaptations. I then tried Margaret Atwood's Good Bones and Simple Murders, a collection of essays and other short fiction published in the 90's. If it were today, it would have been a blog - mostly experimental writing and mostly satire, and worth the effort if you like Atwood. Also several laugh-out-loud moments, and the sort of writing that rewards a re-read. Finally, a bit of a dud - a nonfiction by a father-daughter team of historians titled The War Queens, about women who have been military leaders, or least led their nations during a war. Covered a number of interesting women (e.g. Boudicca, Cleopatra, Njinga of Angola, Artemisia of Caria, Elizabeth I...) and ending with 3 modern leaders such as Golda Meir, but the style was chatty and not very insightful. I borrowed R.H. Blyth's monumental work Haiku, but discovered I have Vol III, so will be taking it back to the library and getting Vol I instead, for a better introduction. I'm getting rather lost in Vol III.