Time-tested Plants: Thirty Years in a Four-season Garden

In this remarkable book, Pamela Harper takes us on a walk through 30 years of gardening, focusing her attentions on those trees, shrubs, and perennials that have earned her trust and affection for a decade or more-plants that have stood the test of time. Over 250 color photographs of the author's garden are included.

Review :
"Time-Tested Plants" contains a wealth of information from an experienced gardener. -- A. Carman Clark "Camden Herald" (11/16/2000) "Time-Tested Plants" is the next best thing to having a gardern guru on call. -- Rebecca Sawyer-Fay "Country Living Gardener" (02/23/2001) "Time-Tested Plants" will stimulate your imagination as it did mine. -- Bobbie Schwartz "Buckeye" (11/29/2000) [The book] distills the author's 30 years of experience gardening in Virginia, brilliantly delineating her successes and failures with a great range of plants. A digressive survey of plants worth growing, written by someone worth paying attention to. -- Verlyn Klinkenborg "New York Times Book Review" (12/03/2000) A truly interesting and captivating book. A well-rounded view of building and maintaining a complete garden environment.... Along the author's garden path, you will find some new plants and some time-tested wisdom on how to cultivate and combine them. -- C. Colston Burrell "Fine Gardening" (12/19/2001) Although very beautiful, this book will not become a "coffee table" book simply for show. It will provide an authoritative, practical reference, which will answer most of the gardener's questions, and it will do it in such a way as to keep him reading well beyond the plant in question. -- Bob Savage "Cornell Cooperative Extension" (06/25/2001) An excellent encyclopedia for beginning gardeners. -- Nell Lewis "Greensboro News and Record" (11/25/2000) Anytime an author can tell me how to prune a wisteria in one paragraph and make it as clear as just-washed windows, I'm going to buy that book. Pamela Harper's book is filled with such succinct pearls . . . Believe it, there are enough plants here to give even the most diehard gardener something to discover. -- Kym Pokorny "Oregonian" (06/07/2001) Beautifully illustrated with all but two of the photographs taken in the author's garden...Well-written and is recommended to all plant lovers. -- Michael G. Messina "American Reference Books Annual" (04/24/2001) Clearly based on many years of practical experience and a passion for plants . . . charmingly personal. Combine the eye and passion for gardening that comes with being English with three decades of hands-on experience in the hot and humid South and you get a voice worth hearing...Definitely above the crowd. -- Nancy Brachey "Charlotte Observer" (12/13/2000) Explanations of plant care are enlivened by Harper's sprightly prose.Harper admits to just 'playing' in this paradise she's created, but her sumptuous photographs, which burst with heat and humidity or winter's chill, reveal how successful her 'playing' has been. Few are the garden books that the reader can open at random and find entries that salute plants not only with readable text but with a stunning picture too . . . [This book] is full of such engaging descriptions and photographs. -- Peter Loewer "American Gardener" (01/25/2001) Harper describes her garden in great detail, giving readers a sense of history and perspective. -- Sarah Robertson "Eugene Register-Guard" (11/29/2000) Harper shares her successes and failures; what grows where and why, sometimes defying nature.... Photos of the garden enhance the experience. -- Marty Figley "Michigan Observer and Eccentric" (03/29/2001) Her genuine knowledge of the plants, and her keen awareness of their strengths and weaknesses, is what makes this book such an enjoyable and enriching learning experience. -- Steve Whysall "Vancouver Sun" (11/24/2000) In telling us what they know [Christopher] Lloyd and [Pamela] Harper cannot help also telling us what they see and what they think. This not only makes their accounts entertaining, but also reveals the inner workings of the gardener's mind, qualities that transcend the local, climatic vagaries of their respective gardens. -- Adrian Higgins "Washington Post" (09/14/2000) In this remarkable book, [the] author takes us on a walk through thirty years of gardening in good conditions and bad, season by season. -- Mumbi Chembur "Educational Book Review" (06/23/2002) It is a unique resource for help in a plant selection process, which is a barrier for many gardeners. -- Richard Poffenbaugh "Mansfield News Journal" (11/16/2001) It will provide an authoritative, practical reference, which will answer most of the gardener's questions, and it will do it in such a way as to keep him reading well beyond the plant in question. -- Bob Savage "Gardening in Orange County" (06/04/2001) Like having an expert gardener as a private tutor in the ways of plants and gardening. -- Jude Lowe "Christian Science Monitor" (08/01/2001) Look at the book, read it from cover to cover, then consider that it's all been done on just two acres. Now that's inspiration. My choice for a recently published plant book that a landscape-design-oriented person will want to have on his or her coffee table. -- Joel M. Lerner "Washington Post" (11/25/2000) My hopes have been far exceeded by the reality of Pamela Harper...I value her advice... One gets a nice sense of a master gardener's "case study." -- Ann Milovsoroff "Pappus" (06/21/2001) Pamela Harper has 'a quality of her own'. She is a distinctive garden writer, in large measure because she is a gardener first and a writer second. I recommend all serious gardeners buy this book, then read and re-read it. -- Tom W. Dillard "Butler Center for Arkansas Studies" (08/01/2001) Pamela Harper's "Time-Tested Plants: Thirty Years in a Four-Season Garden" has September as its official date of publication, but I am so keen for this truly indispensable and completely original book that I want to jump the gun. -- Allen Lacy "Homeground" (08/22/2000) Reading Harper's book is like taking a guided tour with the intrepid gardener to meet those plants that populate her little world. -- Lynette Walther "Palatka Daily News" (06/01/2001) She is always realistic and honest and that is why this book is so unique.And...Each description about a plant is like poetry. She is opinionated in her preferences. . . but informed and discriminating as only a reigning garden expert can be. She abounds with tips and eye-opening ideas. A work by a gardener of Harper's stature belongs in sizeable horticultural collections everywhere. She tells us the problems she has had with plants along with the good. The result is a beautiful, helpful book for the beginner or advanced gardener. The book contains 250 color photographs...that beautifully illustrate the author's breadth of garden know-how. This is a wonderful resource for experienced and beginning gardeners alike. The book is a must for every gardener who grows perennials. -- Robert Stiffler "Norfolk Virginian-Pilot" (10/03/2000) The books offers the knowledgeable perspective of an experienced gardener, teaching newcomers of the world of planting about what works and how to achieve a beautiful landscape all year-round. -- Beth Anderson "Timber Homes Illustrated" (07/13/2001) The year's most helpful design book for hands-on gardeners. -- Carol Stocker "Boston Globe" (02/22/2001) This book is a joy and asks us all to play a duet with it, patiently, critically and over the next 30 years. This book is highly recommended as winter reading or as a gift to a consummate gardening friend or relative. The text is charmingly written; the reader can't help but be enchanted by Harper's tales of her 30-year long experiences in the same garden. It makes us stop and think about creating beautiful combinations of plants to keep our gardens interesting throughout the year, not just in the peak spring and early summer seasons. This book is well-written as is recommended to all plant lovers. This book will help you choose the best possible plants for adverse growing conditions. -- Connie Krochmal "Washington Daily News" (07/16/2003) This delightful book allows readers to vicariously appreciate and learn from an established and very lovely garden through all seasons. -- Sarah Robertson "Roseburg News-Review" (12/07/2000) This is a four-season book. Enjoy it indoors throughout the winter and let it inspire you outdoors the remainder of the year. -- Patricia A. Taylor "Trenton Times" (11/26/2000) This is an exceptional gardening book for anyone who enjoys learning about special plants with superb garden writing thrown in for good measure -- Cynthia Boyd "Newfoundland Horticultural Society Newsletter" (04/13/2001) This is one book that I found hard to put down . . . [The author's] writing style and essays on the plants contained in the book are easily read, in a wonderful story-telling style that is uniquely Pam's. -- Russell Studebaker "Tulsa World" (12/16/2000) This remarkable book has plant combinations and cultural tips galore, so beginners and experts alike will enjoy it. Great pictures of Harper's garden in Virginia enhance the wonderful text. Give it with a pad and pencil because the reader will enjoy scribbling down lots of ideas. Two particular strengths - the pictures are all relevant and the book concentrates fully on plants that look well together, without drifting off into the broader aspects of garden design. When reading this book I found my self not only nodding in agreement with Harper's descriptive usage of plants but grabbing for a pencil and pad to add that plant to my 'must have' list for my own garden.This book is worth reading at least twice. -- Donna Michael "Horticulture Newsletter" (09/06/2001) While we are fortunate to have a wealth of new, old, and up-to-date books available on many aspects of creating and maintaining a garden, few have been as complete as this publication. -- Marianne Truby "California Garden" (04/13/2001) Will have any gardener - beginning to pro - yearning for digging weather. -- Nancy Brachey "Charlotte Observer" (09/30/2002) Will have any gardener--beginner to pro--yearning for digging weather. -- Nancy Brachey "Charlotte Observer" (11/11/2001)