A Garden from a Hundred Packets of Seed

#151
Title: A Garden from a Hundred Packets of Seed
Author: James Fenton
Publisher: Farrar, Straus & Giroux
Year: 2001
Genre: Garden
125 pages

Okay, but not as enjoyable as it ought to have been. I picked it up thinking it would be an account or journal of, well, a garden planted from 100 packet of seed. This seemed interesting. In fact, it's about a hundred seeds the author recommends, sorted by categories (e.g., "Useful and Decorative Herbs"). This is less interesting to me, and rendered less interesting still by the author's somewhat condescending tone. Several times I wished I could say to him, "Just tell me why you like a plant, not why someone else's gardening book or garden style is inferior."

Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded: August 27, 1883

#150
Title: Krakatoa: The Day the World Exploded: August 27, 1883 (P.S.)
Author: Simon Winchester
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Year: 2005
Genre: Southeast Asia, History, Science
416 pages 

I like Winchester, and I like volcanoes and other geological formations, but this did not quite cohere in a compelling way. It's hard to say why, since I enjoyed the history, first-person accounts, digressions into topics such as transcontinental communication, and discussion of subduction zones. However, I was never gripped by the narrative. Maybe this edition's very small print contributed to the problem, but I felt like I was slogging along. This is puzzling since Winchester's ostensibly less gripping topics, such as The Map That Changed the World, held my attention just fine. I'll try again in a while with A Crack in the Edge of the World, which is about The San Francisco earthquake of 1906.

Lady Friday

#149
Title: Lady Friday
Author: Garth Nix
Publisher:  Scholastic
Year: 2007
Genre: children's/young adult, fantasy & science fiction
304 pages 

Part 5 of the Keys to the Kingdom series. As Arthur closes in on the more powerful trustees, he must confront their superior skills and resources. This volume seems more loosely constructed than the previous four, with a certain (extra) amount of deus ex machina and, perhaps, plot points that fade in importance. It's possible that these points will return, and that the reader is intended to be lulled into a false sense of security.

Alas, Superior Saturday will not be available until August, 2008!