FIVE STARS

Should you be so fortunate as to come across a copy of this book, do not expect it to be a Table book with pages languishing over the most perfect of English gardens. You will not find the proverbial glossy photographs of flowers with their proverbial Latin names scribed beneath in flourish hand.

"You must not look to it for guidance. It will not tell you how to prune a rose-bush...No...I fear that this book holds little practical wisdom. But if any gardeners should honour (sic) me by turning its pages, idly, after their day's work is done, I hope that from time to time they may be tempted to smile, not unkindly, at the recollections of their own early follies. And I hope that there may come to them, once more, a faint tremor of that first ecstasy which shook them when they learnt that a garden is the only mistress who never fails, who never fades..."

(John) Beverley Nichols (1898–1983) 

English Journalist, writer of mysteries,

plays, children’s stories and autobiographies, 

best remembered for his gardening books.

In 1928, Nichols purchased a Tudor built in 1520 Glatton, England. It’s garden badly neglected. This is a book about a journey into the world of a novice gardener who finds his obsession.

A magical book

Semi-autobiographical

Reprint facsimile of the original 1932 publication by Jonathan Cape,

by Timber Press (2010)

290 pages

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