Book Review: Incredible Edibles

I've been growing my own veggies in my tiny urban garden for over a decade now, and most of the time I still wonder if I have a clue what I'm doing! I've read quite a few books on vegetable gardening, and most of the time I come away feeling overwhelmed and wondering if I'm ever going to "get it right". So I was delighted to stumble across this book in my library's new additions section.

Incredible Edibles: 43 Fun Things to Grow in the City by Sonia Day is the book I wish I'd had when I made my first foray into urban vegetable gardening. At a sleek124 pages, it's not intimidating at all. It's filled with honest and witty advice about how to effectively grow fruits, herbs and vegetables in small urban spaces.

The book begins with "The Ten Commandments of Growing Food in the City" (which includes encouragement to "Think Twice Before Planting These" - Day is quite upfront about which vegetables aren't going to cut it in your urban garden).

The bulk of the book is made up of a two-page entry for each of the fruits, vegetables and herbs that Day recommends for urban gardening success. These run the gamut from the incredibly commonplace (chives and mint) to some more exotic offerings (asparagus peas and ground cherries, anyone?) Included for each item are the degree of difficulty to grow (ranging from "easy" to "can be cranky"), light requirements, whether it's suitable for container growing, how to start the plant (seeds or started plants),  common problems, when to harvest, how to store, and how many plants to grow. Specific varieties of each plant that are particularly suitable for urban growing are recommended as well. Most of the entries also include a recipe, in case you're not quite sure what to do with your garden bounty. Accompanying the text are food photos stunning enough that you want to reach out and grab them off the page for a little snack.

I certainly picked up a few tips from this delightful little book (and I'm contemplating the addition of ground cherries to my repertoire!) I would highly recommend this book to any novice urban gardener.

(Disclaimer: if you purchase the book through the link in this post, I will receive a small commission from Amazon)

BOOK REVIEW: Death of a Garage Sale Newbie

I decided I'm going to do a book review every other week or so (at least that's the current plan, we'll see how it goes!) While I expect most of the books I review will be non-fiction, I thought it would be fun to start off with some easy-reading fiction, perfect for your beach bag.

I stumbled upon Death of a Garage Sale Newbie by accident, when searching my library's card catalogue for books on fixing up yard sale finds. Of course I couldn't resist checking out a book with a title like that!

The story involves a group of four women known as "The Bargain Hunters Network": Ginger, an empty-nester and expert penny-pincher, is struggling with her marriage; Suzanne, a reformed spendthrift and busy mom, is pregnant with baby number four; Kindra's a college student learning how to survive on a small budget; and Mary Margret is a kind-hearted real estate agent and aspiring frugalista.

One Saturday morning, a member of the group disappears after a seemingly innocent garage sale purchase turns sinister. The local police force doesn't take their concerns seriously, so the remaining three women pull together to figure out what happened to their friend.

I found this to be a fun and enjoyable read. Author Sharon Dunn, a fellow frugalista who "can't recall paying full price for anything", has created a group of very human and likable characters that I could imagine myself being a part of, and I was sad to leave them at the end of the book. There is a second book in the series,
Death of a Six-Foot Teddy Bear; unfortunately my library doesn't have a copy, so I'll be keeping an eye out for a secondhand volume at all my usual thrifty haunts.

To keep the frugal fun going after you've read her books, the author features a "bargain hunters" page on her website where you can stop by and leave your favourite tightwad tips, too.

Have you read any good fiction featuring thrifty characters? Please share in the comments!