Here in the US, all things garden related are, well…pretty much relegated to back corners in bookstores, and odd hours on high number channels on TV.  Annoying, but I have to say, not entirely undeserved.  Seriously, I have a little rant about the general quality of the marketing and packaging of garden books and garden personalities.   While we in the garden media have alot to offer in the way of ideas and information, I think the rule is to generally suck at marketing ourselves to people outside the little garden and landscape design world.  We act a little like you must be hard core to take part.  I want to banish that and throw open the doors.  I can’t wait to see rock and roll gardeners, younger generations, and green minded souls start to change the image of gardening in this country…make it quiky, make it fun, make it a reflection of an individual. I am looking forward to a day when gardening has become cool, hip, stylish, educated and more than just trendy, but an enduring change to our lives.   All of which, I think will need the media to feed and help build.   Garden Media folks…I think we have our work cut out for us…and we need to step it up.

Ok – Rant over….enter Amy Stewart – writer and contributor to Garden Rant — and her new book Wicked Plants: The Weed That Killed Lincoln’s Mother and Other Botanical Atrocities.   It’s the whole package….cool cover art, interesting topics, and at last, some humor and entertainment quality to the marketing of a plant book.  I mean really, gardens, garden topics, plants, design, growing, etc. etc…these are subjects that can be interesting to the masses… (must I mention again that in England some garden shows actually air in prime time)…it just needs to be packaged correctly — Wicked Plants is a good first step — I could absolutely see an interesting TV show springing from this couldn’t you?…I think Amy, and her team at Algonquin Books deserve a stand-up round of applause for creative and clever marketing and packaging.