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NonfictionNatureCrafts, Hobbies & Home

Gift books: For the gardener, the composter, the lover of flowers

Feature by Annie Peters

As in one of the loveliest lines attributed to Margaret Atwood, “In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.”

For those who love to spend time outside in their garden, four entertaining books on clouds, bees, flower scents and Emily Dickinson’s gardens will provide ample diversion during the cold, wet days of winter.

A Cloud a Day by Gavin Pretor-Pinney
How often do you really notice the beauty and diversity of clouds? Readers of Gavin Pretor-Pinney’s A Cloud a Day will be hard-pressed to ignore the skies again. He has gathered a year’s worth of cloud pictures from all over the world, many of which were taken by members of his Cloud Appreciation Society. Thought-provoking quotations and explanations of lesser-known cloud formations accompany the photos. He even includes clouds from unexpected places like distant planets and famous paintings. Fun charts aid readers in navigating the book by helping them locate certain cloud formations, artworks, optical effects and imaginative descriptions. In his introduction, Pretor-Pinney explains that we live upon an ocean of gasses, and that it would improve the quality of our lives to spend a bit of time noticing that ever-changing ocean around us. After perusing this enlightening book, many readers will agree.

The Little Book of Bees by Hilary Kearney
Most of us are aware that our honeybees are endangered, but few may realize how fascinating these helpful creatures really are or the ways we can support them. Hilary Kearney’s The Little Book of Bees proves an excellent remedy for these shortcomings. A beekeeper, writer and artist who hosts workshops for other beekeepers, Kearney starts by providing brief, digestible descriptions of flowers, pollination and bee evolution. She goes on to describe bee anatomy, the many types of bees and their various social organizations. Next, she turns to honey: what it is, the different types and its uses. Finally, she offers an introduction to beekeeping, an explanation of why bees are endangered and a list of easy steps the average person can take to help them. For readers who wish to know more, Kearney provides a brief list of additional resources. For all its usefulness, The Little Book of Bees is also filled with wonderful illustrations by Amy Holliday and fascinating tidbits of bee trivia, making this book not only a treasure trove of information for those interested in bees but also delightfully entertaining.

The Scentual Garden by Ken Druse
Bees naturally bring flowers to mind, and Ken Druse delivers a unique approach to flower gardening in The Scentual Garden. Druse focuses on plants solely through their significance to our sense of smell. He begins by providing a brief but provocative explanation of why plants produce a scent, how our olfactory sense works and methods for capturing scent. By far the bulk of the book, however, is an encyclopedia of fragrant plants with incredibly sensual descriptions that will help even the most dejected gardener endure the darkest days of winter. The most striking aspect of the book is the absolutely exquisite garden photographs by Druse and botanical photographs by Ellen Hoverkamp. While the information contained in the encyclopedia may prove eye-opening to new and experienced gardeners alike, the photographs make The Scentual Garden a gorgeous addition to any home.

Emily Dickenson’s Gardening Life by Marta McDowell
Finally, for gardeners with an affection for poetry, Marta McDowell’s Emily Dickinson’s Gardening Life may prove a perfect choice. In this newly revised and expanded edition, McDowell, a past Gardener-in-Residence at the Emily Dickinson Museum, first surveys Dickinson’s life, describing the garden at the poet’s lifelong home throughout the seasons. McDowell frequently quotes Dickinson’s poetry to highlight pertinent connections between her garden and her writing.  Although no photographs of Dickinson’s garden taken during her lifetime have been discovered, McDowell includes lovely hand-drawn botanical illustrations by Dickinson’s contemporaries and colorful, present-day photos of some of the plants in question, as well as vintage and modern photographs of significant buildings and landscapes. McDowell also includes chapters on how to plant a garden similar to Dickinson’s, the painstaking efforts to restore Dickinson’s garden and a detailed list of the plants cultivated by the Dickinson family. Taken as a whole, Emily Dickinson’s Gardening Life gives readers the real sense that they can almost slip back in time and survey Dickinson’s garden with her.

As in one of the loveliest lines attributed to Margaret Atwood, “In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.”
NonfictionFood & DrinkCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooks

Lifestyles: January 2020

Feature by Susannah Felts

These three new lifestyles releases will help you kick 2020 off right.

★ The Thank-You Project
You probably have several thank-you notes to write after the holidays, which may feel like just one more item on your to-do list. But what if you thought about thank-yous differently? When she turned 50, Nancy Davis Kho began writing thoughtful letters of gratitude to the people (and places and things) that had shaped her life for the better. In The Thank-You Project, Kho shares stories from her project and encourages us to embark on our own versions. Her process boils down to three main tasks: “see, say, and savor” your memories of formative people, places and things. Kho is a funny, relatable and not-too-sentimental guide to this deeply meaningful practice.

Weeknight Baking
Procrasti-baking: It’s a thing. You’re on a massive work deadline, but you’re mixing cookie batter because baking makes you feel good. Michelle Lopez of the blog Hummingbird High knows all about it, and she’s here to help all of us fit baking into our busy lives. In Weeknight Baking, Lopez applies time management skills to flexible recipes, so you can put together a cake over a few nights or substitute ingredients when the pantry doesn’t cooperate. She shares a list of the right tools—for instance, you’re going to want a quarter sheet pan for freezing cookie dough. Of course, you may be looking for instant gratification, and Lopez has your back there, too, with her “Single Lady Chocolate Chip Cookie” that gives you one beautiful, 4-inch-wide personal dessert in only 12 minutes. What weeknight doesn’t need that?

Growing Good Food
There are lots of good reasons to grow a garden, and now we can add climate change to the list. In Growing Good Food, Acadia Tucker explains that regenerative farming—which focuses on healthy, organic matter-rich soil—is one simple way to soak up carbon emissions. In making the case for a nation full of “carbon-sucking mini farms,” she recalls the victory gardens of World War II, a successful grassroots response to the war effort. Her book outlines steps for becoming a carbon farmer, no matter how small your plot, and suggests starter plants (go with perennials, not annuals), fertilizers, organic pest control solutions and how to make good compost. This is a slim but smart volume of gardening expertise and a necessary call to arms.

These three new lifestyles releases will help you kick 2020 off right.

★ The Thank-You Project
You probably have several thank-you notes to write after the holidays, which may feel like just one more item on your to-do list. But what if you…

NatureCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooks

Lifestyles: March 2020

Feature by Susannah Felts

This month’s best new lifestyles books teach you how to enjoy the simple things in life, understand a new language and cook with a song in your heart.

★ Meals, Music, and Muses

“Cooking without a song—in your heart, if nothing else—is like cooking without salt and pepper,” writes chef Alexander Smalls in Meals, Music, and Muses. Here, recipes grounded in the culinary traditions of the African American South are grouped according to the “seven styles of African American music that set the bass line for this medley of meals.” Fried sweet white corn and a salad of field greens and black-eyed peas are among the “green things” that Smalls associates with gospel music; rice, pasta and grits are the stuff of spirituals. Roast quail, pan-fried rabbit, pork loin roasts? Divas, all. There are biscuits and beans and pie to the tune of jazz, opera, jukebox music and serenades (sweet endings), with the pleasure of Smalls’ storytelling along the way to deepen the flavor.

How to Wash the Dishes

How is it that reading a book on washing the dishes could offer such pleasure? How to Wash the Dishes, by Seattle design and architectural bookstore owner Peter Miller, is a tiny, perfect book that offers just what its title proclaims, with a side dish of calm. In serene and measured prose, Miller reminds us that “washing the dishes in a sink, with clean, warm water, is a luxury” and “a task of order and of health and hygiene.” Also, to no small degree, “every time you wash the dishes is an opportunity to practice mindfulness and to reduce waste.” Great satisfaction can come from holding fast to these truths and focusing on the task at hand, not rushing, not thinking too much of other things.

The Complete Language of Flowers

Flower lovers will marvel at S. Theresa Dietz’s The Complete Language of Flowers, an A to Z of flowers and plants listing symbolic meanings, possible powers, folklore and facts. The flowers are alphabetized by Latin name, which lends this volume an air of the exotic, but the book’s handy index is probably where you’ll start when you want to find out what your snake plant might do for you (protection) or what bluebonnets represent (forgiveness, self-sacrifice and survival). This guide could be helpful for writers and artists seeking to infuse their work with floral imagery, or for designers and gardeners planning a project. But it’s also simply a gorgeous conversation piece, the perfect addition to a spring coffee table vignette.

This month’s best new lifestyles books teach you how to enjoy the simple things in life, understand a new language and cook with a song in your heart.

★ Meals, Music, and Muses

“Cooking without a song—in your heart, if nothing else—is like cooking…

NonfictionNatureFood & DrinkCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooks

Lifestyles: June 2020

Feature by Susannah Felts

Cook with a surprise ingredient, understand modern-day manners and build an herbal arsenal with the help of these three engaging reads.

★ The Duke’s Mayonnaise Cookbook

My first thought upon discovering The Duke’s Mayonnaise Cookbook was: an entire cookbook devoted to . . . mayonnaise? Risky business. My second thought was: But . .  . it’s Duke’s, a brand with a cult following—especially in the American South, where I live. And when you’ve got a following like Duke’s, you do what you want—like show up in a recipe for peppermint fudge brownies. Ashley Strickland Freeman makes a strong case that Duke’s belongs in brownies, as well as in many other seemingly unlikely recipes, because mayo is “a beautiful emulsification of eggs and oil and a touch of vinegar for acidity, all ingredients vital to cooking and baking.” Her cookbook makes my mouth water, with crowd-pleasers such as bananas Foster bread with browned butter-rum glaze, pimento cheese grits and firecracker shrimp tacos. And of course, there’s elote—delicious Mexican street corn slathered in mayonnaise.

Minding Miss Manners

In Minding Miss Manners, Judith Martin’s arch, acid wit laces every lesson on behaving with propriety in a culture where monstrous jerks are, more than ever, on parade and in power. “A new era of freedom to be loutish, pushy, vicious, and hateful is upon us,” she writes. “That an etiquette-free society would be a joyous, or even livable, one must be the biggest social hoax since it was declared that Americans’ basic problem was sexual puritanism, and if all were acting freely on their desires, everyone would be happy, and there would be no more sex crimes. We are now forced to see how that has played out.” Ahem! This book is bracingly funny and full of pitch-perfect truth bombs for our very weird and wooly times. 

Plant Magic

For Christine Buckley, herbalism is more than just the process of using plants for their beneficial properties. It’s a way of being in the world—more in tune with the earth and mindful of one’s own interconnected mind, body and spirit. In Plant Magic, Buckley takes us deep into the practice of herbalism, showing us how to cultivate a meaningful relationship with the plant life around us. Her “herbal arsenal” details 21 of the most useful and accessible plants, such as cinnamon, thyme, lemon balm and ginger. Roost makes gorgeous books, and this one is no exception

Cook with a surprise ingredient, understand modern-day manners and build an herbal arsenal with the help of these three engaging reads.
NonfictionCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooks

Lifestyles: July 2020

Feature by Susannah Felts

Three books invite you to bake delicious, vegan treats; learn to walk more lightly on the planet and travel by tent with children in tow.

★ Perfectly Golden

Angela Garbacz makes her cookbook debut with Perfectly Golden, a trove of treats from her popular bakery, Goldenrod Pastries in Lincoln, Nebraska. Garbacz became devoted to dietary-­inclusive baking after developing a dairy sensitivity, and her bakery uses nondairy milks exclusively (almond is her go-to). Here she reveals her top tricks for delicious sweets that are also gluten free and vegan, including decadent buns, cakes, cookies and more. (You can make any of the recipes in the traditional way, too, using cow’s milk and eggs.) While this bright and cheerful cookbook is decidedly contemporary in its methods, Garbacz bakes from a strong family tradition, and she includes tweaked versions of old favorites, such as her mom’s turtle cookies: cooked in a waffle iron and dolloped with peanut butter frosting. It’s truly a guide to sweets for all tastes and preferences.

An Almost Zero Waste Life

You probably think that a zero-waste life sounds appealing. You may also think it sounds exhausting to achieve. I’m with you on both counts, but after exploring the solutions offered by Megean Weldon in An Almost Zero Waste Life, I’m newly enthusiastic about my family’s ability to slash our trash. Weldon is practical in her guidance, and she urges readers to use up their disposables before replacing them with sustainable alternatives. After that, small changes start to add up: Snip old T-shirts into rags, start composting and cook more homemade food. I especially like Weldon’s weekly menu examples, designed to cut vegetable waste, and her section on holidays, which includes a list of 101 zero-waste gift ideas.

See You at the Campground

Though See You at the Campground was published earlier this spring, I think it deserves a shout-out now as we enter prime camping season. Parents and podcasters Stephanie and Jeremy Puglisi lay out the pros and cons of vacationing via tent, RV or cabin and are forthcoming about their missteps as they learned to navigate the great outdoors with their three sons. Now seasoned experts, they share packing lists, choice campgrounds, campfire grub, campground etiquette and advice for exploring national parks. Armed with this book, even the most avid camper will be better prepared for the next adventure with children in tow.

Three books invite you to bake delicious, vegan treats; learn to walk more lightly on the planet and travel by tent with children in tow.

★ Perfectly Golden

Angela Garbacz makes her cookbook debut with Perfectly Golden, a trove of treats from her popular bakery, Goldenrod…

NonfictionReligion & SpiritualityNatureFood & DrinkCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooks

Lifestyles: August 2020

Feature by Susannah Felts

Investigate the power of habit, make delicious Chicano food or ponder a new approach to your lawn with this month’s trio of lifestyle reads.

★ The Power of Ritual

The “sacred” may seem conceptually distant from our increasingly secular lives, but it shouldn’t, says Casper ter Kuile in The Power of Ritual. He argues that any habit or practice can become sacred through ritual, allowing us to develop our own modern versions of spiritual life. Here he explores how reframing habits as rituals can help us build connection on four interweaving levels: with ourselves, other people, the natural world and the transcendent. “What I propose is this: by composting old rituals to meet our real-world needs, we can regrow deeper relationships and speak to our hunger for meaning and depth,” he writes. In a world that can frequently feel upside-down and precarious, this well-researched book may provide vital ballast.

Chicano Eats

Esteban Castillo grew up near Los Angeles, making frequent trips to his parents’ homeland of Colima, Mexico. When he later moved to Northern California, he found Humboldt County seriously lacking in the cuisine of his family, so he started a blog to celebrate that food culture. Chicano Eats brings his work to print in festive color, highlighting the ingredients, kitchen tools and playful hybridity of Chicano cooking—Mexican cuisine shaped by immigrants to America over generations, reflecting a community “who’s neither from there or here.” The perfect pot of beans, arroz rojo and salsa molcajete will get you started, and then it’s off to botanas (snacks) such as carnitas poutine, lots of tacos, several versions of pozole (a stew made with hominy and pork) and much more.

Lawns Into Meadows

Americans love lush, green lawns. But the truth is, all those manicured yards are hard on the environment. They guzzle water, chemicals and fossil fuels and do nothing to encourage a biodiverse ecosystem of pollinators, wildlife and microbe-rich soil. In Lawns Into Meadows, Owen Wormser shows us how to forgo grass in favor of native plant meadows, a more climate-friendly option for your green space. Wormser suggests 21 hardy, easy-to-grow perennials that will fill out in no time, like black-eyed Susan, golden­rod and purple coneflower, along with meadow-­making designs to suit a variety of yard sizes. If this is a topic that interests you, there are many more guides in the nifty Citizen Gardening series from Stone Pier Press.

Investigate the power of habit, make delicious Chicano food or ponder a new approach to your lawn with this month’s trio of lifestyle reads.

★ The Power of Ritual

The “sacred” may seem conceptually distant from our increasingly secular lives, but it shouldn’t, says Casper ter…

NonfictionNatureFood & DrinkCrafts, Hobbies & HomeArt

Lifestyles: September 2020

Feature by Susannah Felts

From fashion to flowers to foodie comforts, this month's best lifestyles books are here to inform, delight and soothe.

★ Mend!

I am not a big sewer (OK, I am not a sewer at all), but I can’t stop poring over Kate Sekules’ Mend! A Refashioning Manual and Manifesto. A seasoned travel editor and writer, Sekules brings a refreshingly fierce voice to an assemblage of topics: the wastefulness and exploitative practices of the fashion industry, the sustainability of slow fashion, the history of clothing, stars of the mending scene and more. Visible mending, or VM, is her chief cause. “To stitch or sport a VM is to declare independence from consumer culture with a beautiful scar and badge of honor,” she writes. A prim sewing guide this is not, and I am here for it. If you want sewing basics, Sekules does offer them, but along the way she will school you on where fashion has been and where it’s going (to the grave?).

Floriography

For some time now I have been a big admirer of Jessica Roux’s illustrations, which feel rooted in a time that’s decidedly not the present. So I was thrilled to discover her new book, Floriography, an A to Z of flowers and the meanings they were given by flower-mad Victorians. Back then, people weren’t so quick to emote socially; rather, they let petals do the talking for them. Roux provides a brief but fascinating history of this coded discourse and then shows us the flowers, in her distinct style, from amaryllis (pride) to zinnia (everlasting friendship). A final section illustrates bouquets—for new beginnings, bitter ends, warnings and more—and an index lists the flowers by meaning.

The Art of Cake

Alice Oehr’s The Art of Cake is not a cake cookbook—just a whimsically illustrated book about cake, with precise physical descriptions of and historical and cultural context for 50 cakes, such as Pavlova, linzertorte, charlotte and pound cake. “I am not a professional baker by any stretch of the imagination,” Oehr writes in a note about the final section of the book, in which she provides recipes (the only ones in the book) for six cakes. I’m intrigued by Oehr’s inclusion of banoffee pie, a dessert that she describes as “pie” twice in addition to its name. But particularly in these times, such quibbles are minor, and we could all use a bit more cake.

From fashion to flowers to foodie comforts, this month's best lifestyles books are here to inform, delight and soothe.

★ Mend!

I am not a big sewer (OK, I am not a sewer at all), but I can’t stop poring over Kate Sekules’ Mend! A Refashioning…

NonfictionCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooksBody, Mind & Spirit

Lifestyles: October 2020

Feature by Susannah Felts

In this month's roundup of new lifestyles books, witchy recipes, spooky treats and meat-eating plants provide the seasonal escapism we all crave.

★ A Kitchen Witch’s Guide to Recipes for Love & Romance

Food gives us energy; food is energy. This framing of cooking as a blend of mindful practice and energy work, right alongside reiki and acupuncture, is at the root of Dawn Aurora Hunt’s A Kitchen Witch’s Guide to Recipes for Love & Romance. Adding witchcraft to the mix—think candles, smudge sticks, essential oils, mantras—takes things from healthy and delicious to sensual sorcery. Bow tie pasta with lemon and artichokes, when paired with the practice of “creating a sacred space for enriching love and togetherness,” becomes a way to rekindle the flame and honor a season of new beginnings. Peaches and cream? Way sexier with a sigil carved into the peach flesh. Grab your wooden spoons, some white sage and a box of matches, and make some kitchen magic for—and with—your partner.

The Wicked Baker

The Wicked Baker is Helena Garcia’s celebration of all treats spooky and strange. If you take even the eensiest dram of pleasure from Halloween, you’ll enjoy every page. A Cousin Itt made of shredded phyllo wears round green spectacles of gingerbread dough. A cake resembling a black candle drips blood-red “wax” icing. Many of these complex creations are not for the faint of heart. But hey, the Brain Cinnamon Rolls sound manageable, and I’m game to whip up the pale green Slime Pudding that’s little more than Greek yogurt, condensed milk and citrus. This book brings the holiday escapism we all crave.

Killer Plants

Killer Plants is your go-to for carnivorous cultivars like bladderworts, pitcher plants and Venus’ flytraps. “The plants in this book present a bit of a challenge to their keepers,” author Molly Williams tells us upfront. That is, they’re pretty persnickety when it comes to care—they insist upon distilled water and special potting mix, for starters—but are possibly worth it for the weird-and-rare factor if you’re a plant-hound. Williams even goes a step further in a section on “Rare Carnivorous Plants You May Never Find,” which reads like an episode of “Nature.” Niche though these plants may be, entire shops and societies around the world are devoted to them. A list of contacts rounds out the book, so you can go forth and find your fellow killer-plant people.

In this month's roundup of new lifestyles books, witchy recipes, spooky treats and meat-eating plants provide the seasonal escapism we all crave.

★ A Kitchen Witch’s Guide to Recipes for Love & Romance

Food gives us energy; food is energy. This framing of…

NonfictionFictionCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooks

The Hold List: Books to spark and nourish the creative spirit

Feature by the editors of BookPage

Creativity is all about letting what’s inside of us out. Whether you’re searching for inspiration, looking for a step-by-step guide to a new hobby or eager for a glimpse into the creative life, these books will light the fire within.

Cross Stitch for the Soul

While visiting my parents in Texas for Christmas in 2017, I asked my mom, a devoted quilter, if she could teach me to cross-stitch. We went to a craft store the very next day, and by the time I left for home, I was hooked. I still consider myself a novice, so trust me when I say that the exquisite designs in Cross Stitch for the Soul aren’t beyond the reach of beginners. Designer Emma Congdon applies her colorful typographic sensibility to 20 quotations and aphorisms and creates bold postmodern patterns, each paired with a short personal reflection. She also includes no-nonsense guides to the materials and techniques you’ll need to get started. Stitching, Congdon writes, is “a chance to embrace slowness and create something beautiful at the same time.” I’m grateful to have had the creative outlet of stitching my way through her book this year.

—Stephanie, Associate Editor

Loitering With Intent

Many novels about aspiring authors are, to be blunt, extremely obnoxious. They either portray the writing process with toothache-inducing twinkle or with such overblown and tortured sturm und drang as to make the entire thing ridiculous. Between these two poles lies Muriel Spark’s Loitering With Intent, which trots happily alongside aspiring would-be novelist Fleur Talbot as she breezes through bedraggled postwar London. Fleur is young, highly educated and underemployed, but where others would succumb to ennui, Fleur finds inspiration. Her terrible landlord, her drifting friends and romantic prospects and, most of all, her bizarre boss are prime material for mockery and fictional examination. Nothing about her life is particularly glamorous, which somehow makes it all even more wildly appealing and quietly galvanizing.

—Savanna, Associate Editor

Walking on Water

If you’re looking to spark your creative side, Madeleine L’Engle’s book about spirituality and the creative process is both flint and tinder. Though it uses Christian language (L’Engle was devoutly Anglican), Walking on Water offers artistic nourishment for anyone who feels there’s something mystical taking place when humans make art—the mystery of how ideas come to us, the miracle of making something where there was nothing before. Reading L’Engle’s flowing prose feels devotional, as she meditates on the relationship between faith and art, art and artist. By her estimation, the artist’s responsibility is merely to show up to the page, the canvas or the studio and be open to the work. The work already knows what it wants to be; all we have to do is follow its lead. In this way, the artist’s role shifts from director to humble servant, freeing us up to participate in the collaborative art of creation.

—Christy, Associate Editor

The New Way to Cake

This year I joined the hordes of people coping with anxiety by mixing it, beating it and throwing it in the oven. For me, baking has become a way to touch base with loved ones—outside, at a distance—and, almost as importantly, a way to stay creatively inspired. This cake cookbook from Benjamina Ebuehi (whom you may know from “The Great British Bake Off”) is all about exploring flavors, ingredients and textures in unexpected ways. Many of her recipes have me dreaming of the future: spiced sweet potato loaf, hot chocolate and halva pudding, date and rooibos loaf, cardamom tres leches cake and more. The lemon, ricotta and thyme mini-cakes are on permanent rotation, and I’ll never make carrot cake ever again without adding some breakfast tea. Each bake is a chance to learn something new, find out what an unknown ingredient is like and discover how to do it better next time.

—Cat, Deputy Editor

Susan Sontag: Essays of the 1960s & 70s

The 2019 Met Gala didn’t do camp any justice. A gaggle of elites trying to understand the intricacies of this strange, whimsical, dynamic aesthetic was sure to end in failure, but one can’t help imagining Susan Sontag smiling at their attempt. Sontag coined the term in her essay “Notes on ‘Camp,’” published in 1964 during a drastically different cultural moment. This collection of essays showcases the brilliant mind of one of the 20th century’s most important writers and invites you to think about everything from aesthetics to death to feminism. Whatever the topic, Sontag is cool, compassionate and clear, not to mention impossible to be bored by. Reading this book reminds me of my favorite quotation of hers: “My idea of a writer: someone interested in everything.” She certainly was, and her writing moves me to be, too.

—Eric, Editorial Intern

Creativity is all about letting what’s inside of us out. Whether you’re searching for inspiration, looking for a step-by-step guide to a new hobby or eager for a glimpse into the creative life, these books will light the fire within.

Cross Stitch for the Soul

…
NonfictionDesignCrafts, Hobbies & HomeArts & CultureArt

Make some room on those studio shelves

Feature by Julie Hale

Four fresh art and design books inspire, enlighten and cultivate creativity. Perfect for accomplished artists, occasional dabblers or anyone in search of a new hobby, these terrific titles provide instant inspiration.

The 99% Invisible City

Roman Mars and Kurt Kohlstedt are the dynamic duo behind the architecture and design podcast “99% Invisible,” and their intriguing book, The 99% Invisible City: A Field Guide to the Hidden World of Everyday Design, draws upon the podcast’s concepts by picking out smartly conceived, frequently overlooked components of the urban landscape and explaining how they contribute to a thriving civic environment.

From traffic lights, public signage and historical plaques to manhole covers and city monuments, the book examines design elements big and small, revealing the ways in which they bring clarity to the chaos of modern life. The volume is organized into brief, easy-to-process sections, and it touches down in boroughs around the globe. Filled with nifty line illustrations in bold black and white, this eye-opening book will give readers a fresh appreciation for the beauty and functionality that are inherent—but not immediately apparent—in the urban world.

Open StudioOpen Studio

Open Studio: Do-It-Yourself Art Projects by Contemporary Artists gives readers the chance to craft along with major makers. The authors, curator Sharon Coplan Hurowitz and journalist-filmmaker Amanda Benchley, recruited a group of A-list participants for the volume (Marina Abramovic, William Wegman, Maya Lin—the list goes on), which is packed with brilliant photography, including candid shots of the artists at work.

The book’s 17 wide-ranging projects offer something for everyone. Sculptor Rachel Feinstein’s “Rococo Hut” is a small-scale architectural wonder that you can recreate with cutouts, while multimedia artist Wangechi Mutu’s “Earth Androids,” composed of paper pulp, soil, ink and paint, are simply out of this world. Painter Will Cotton’s foil-paper “The Royal Crown of Candyland” will bring out the kid in any crafter. The step-by-step instructions and how-to photos that accompany each project make staying on track a snap. Open Studio shows that getting creative is easy—especially when you can take cues from world-class artists.

Life in the StudioLife in the Studio

Stimulation, motivation and encouragement—that’s what artistic minds will find in Life in the Studio: Inspiration and Lessons on Creativity, Frances Palmer’s guide to starting—and maintaining—a creative practice. In this beautifully photographed book, Palmer, a celebrated ceramics artist, art historian and successful businesswoman, delivers big-picture advice without neglecting the small details. She shares tips on how to establish a creative routine, identify sources of inspiration and stay engaged. She also provides guidance on hands-on matters such as setting up a studio, with an overview of must-have tools and more.

Throughout the volume, Palmer reflects on how her skills and methods have evolved over her 30-year career. Through pottery projects, flower-arranging tutorials and recipes, she proves that creativity can manifest itself in unexpected ways. Both the seasoned artist and the beginner will be enriched by this stunning guide.

Truth BombTruth Bomb

Abigail Crompton’s Truth Bomb: Inspiration From the Mouths and Minds of Women Artists is as provocative as the title suggests. With a design that combines audacious colors and not-to-be-ignored graphics, the volume spotlights 22 prominent female artists—women from diverse backgrounds working in a wide range of media, including photography, video, painting and performance art.

Crompton, an artist and design-studio entrepreneur, assembled a stellar lineup for the book: Judy Chicago, Mickalene Thomas, Miranda July, Yayoi Kusama and the Guerrilla Girls are among the featured makers. She provides profiles of each, delving into their creative processes and techniques. Along the way, these extraordinary women share bits of hard-won wisdom, words of encouragement and practical advice. The book is also filled with beautifully reproduced examples of their work. Truth Bomb is an invaluable resource for anyone with creative inclinations. From start to finish, it’s a spirited homage to the artistic life.

Four fresh art and design books inspire, enlighten and cultivate creativity.
NonfictionFood & DrinkCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooksBody, Mind & Spirit

Books that are good enough to eat

Feature by Becky Libourel Diamond

Many gourmands are restless from hunkering down these past several months, and the added cold weather is enough to make anyone a bit stir-crazy. But never fear—we’ve rounded up five books that are sure to warm hearts as well as ovens.

Bread Therapy

Bread Therapy: The Mindful Art of Baking Bread couldn’t have come at a better time. Ever since quarantine renewed people’s interest in making home-cooked food for themselves and their loved ones, baking supplies have been flying off the shelves. Yeast is a rare and precious commodity. Sourdough starters are the stars of Instagram. As a university counselor, Pauline Beaumont understands the therapeutic qualities of baking, which takes people out of their comfort zones and allows them to make mistakes. This book’s seven chapters highlight these ideals, intertwining words of wisdom with some interesting bread recipes, such as spinach flatbread and dill and beet bread. As much a self-help book as a cookbook, Bread Therapy is a welcome instructional guide to practicing self-acceptance, staying grounded and making something delicious.

A Field Guide to Cheese 

And what better to top your bread with than cheese? A Field Guide to Cheese: How to Select, Enjoy, and Pair the World’s Best Cheeses is a cheese lover’s dream, educating aficionados through gorgeous pictures and fun, colorful graphics. Cheese expert and journalist Tristan Sicard lays out the book nicely, starting off with “A Quick Chronology of Cheese” that spans from 5000 B.C. to the present day. This is followed by a diagram of dairy breeds—not only cow but also goat, sheep and even buffalo. The 11 families of cheese are also outlined, including information about color, texture, recommended serving tools and emblematic varieties. Finally, each cheese gets its own entry, with over 400 individual profiles in all, including the dairy breed, region of origin, an enticing illustration and a brief description. Further information is given about pairing, preparing and serving cheese, and there’s even a section about how to properly wrap cheese for storage. 

Very Merry Cocktails

Although cheese is usually paired with wine, a creative connoisseur might enjoy a slice with some of the fun drinks featured in Very Merry Cocktails: 50+ Festive Drinks for the Holiday Season. Food writer Jessica Strand (Cooking for Two) provides several helpful cocktail hints, including a list of useful bar tools (stocking stuffer ideas, anyone?), syrup and garnish recipes and tips on how to rim a glass with sugar or salt. Five chapters of holiday cocktail recipes follow, including champagne sippers, holiday party punches and nonalcoholic libations. The recipes are innovative and easy to follow, such as Christmas in July, a tropical-inspired drink featuring crème de coconut, pineapple juice and rum for “when you’re craving warm summer days.” There are also festive twists on old favorites, such as the Moscow Reindeer, a riff on the gingery Moscow Mule. All are complemented by stylish midcentury-inspired photos that capture the season’s celebratory sparkle. 

Hungry Games

Perhaps the most unique spin on a cookbook for this holiday season is Hungry Games: A Delicious Book of Recipe Repairs, Word Searches & Crosswords for the Food Lover, essentially a cookbook of 50 recipes that each contain 10 mistakes for the reader to find. These “puzzles” are ranked in difficulty from easy (such as an apple crumble pie that instructs the baker to toss the apples with pears) to hard (a peach galette that says to mix water with red wine vinegar to make the dough, when it should actually be white distilled vinegar). Luckily there’s an answer key to check your culinary skill, as well as lots of food-themed crosswords and word searches. The result is an unusual and fun gift for the foodie who has everything.

The Best American Food Writing 2020

The 25 short essays in The Best American Food Writing 2020 were actually written in 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic, but that doesn’t make them any less thoughtful or relevant. This year’s editor, the chef and author J. Kenji López-Alt (The Food Lab), writes that although he’s afraid “the book will read like a time capsule,” the pieces he’s selected are still significant to the future of food writing. Topics from substance abuse in restaurant kitchens and the burgeoning global market for baby food, to Jamie Oliver’s eccentric stardom and how spring water is bottled are tackled with humor and consequence, as well as a bit of history mixed in to provide a touchstone between the past and present. All of these wide-ranging pieces were originally published in sources typically known for provocative food writing, such as Eater, the New York Times and the Washington Post. Having them all in one place is a boon for the Epicurean reader.

If you’re looking for the perfect holiday gift for the gastronome in your life, these books will keep them engaged long after the table’s been cleared.

NonfictionCrafts, Hobbies & HomeCookbooksArts & Culture

Lifestyles: February 2021

Feature by Susannah Felts

The writing workshop, the cottagecore aesthetic and, that’s right, the humble bean all get exciting updates in this month’s crop of lifestyles books.

★ Craft in the Real World

Matthew Salesses’ Craft in the Real World is a book whose time has come, and not a moment too soon. A critique of long-held assumptions about how creative writing should be taught, it is “a challenge to accepted models,” including “everything from a character-­driven plot to the ‘cone of silence,’ ” which silences a manuscript’s author while their piece is being workshopped. Salesses, who is the author of three novels, invites the reader to rethink the very notion of what constitutes craft and offers alternatives to a workshop model proliferated by, and largely for, white men. The world has changed, and the writing workshop must catch up. An essential addition to the bookshelf of anyone interested in creative writing, Salesses’ text provides a compassionate approach sure to bring a new generation of authentic voices to the page.

The Mighty Bean

All hail the humble bean: Nutrient-rich, central to cuisines worldwide, inexpensive, easy to cook and with a low carbon footprint, beans are truly a power food. With her new book, The Mighty Bean, Judith Choate, author of An American Family Cooks, is our guide through the vast world of legumes, beginning with a bean glossary. (What wonderful names these little guys have: Rattlesnake! Eye of the goat! Black valentine!) With recipes ranging from Texas caviar to West African peanut soup to white bean gnocchi with bacon and cream, this cookbook travels the globe through “pulses” (another name for beans, and a tidbit I’m delighted to have picked up here) and encourages experimentation. I’m feeling inspired to shop the Rancho Gordo site ASAP.

The Little Book of Cottagecore

I first heard the word cottagecore from my 12-year-old daughter, likely my informant for all trends henceforth. For the uninitiated, cottagecore is a way of being—an aesthetic, a vibe, if you will—exalting the soothing textures and gentle rhythms of pastoral life. “It focuses on unplugging from the stresses of modern life and instead embracing the wholesomeness and authenticity of nature,” explains Emily Kent in The Little Book of Cottage­core. A cottage­core existence might include relaxing tasks such as baking bread, gardening and pouring your own candles—though I have to wonder how truly calm one may feel when feeding a sourdough starter or smoking the hives or coping with tomato blight. (Forgive me. I’ve suffered my share of frustrations during various vaguely cottagecore endeavors.) But simply brewing a cup of proper English tea is entry-level cottagecore that anyone can enjoy.

The writing workshop, the cottagecore aesthetic and, that’s right, the humble bean all get exciting updates in this month’s crop of lifestyles books.
NonfictionCrafts, Hobbies & Home

Lifestyles: April 2021

Feature by Susannah Felts

This month’s selection of the best new lifestyles titles offers gentle reminders to connect to the earth, ask for directions and breathe.

★ The Healing Garden

Two of the first things you’ll see in The Healing Garden are a close-up of a hummingbird cupped in author Deb Soule’s hand and an acknowledgment that her herbal farm occupies Indigenous people’s ancestral lands. Together, these things set a lovely tone for her new guide to herbalism. The founder of Avena Botanicals and author of How to Move Like a Gardener, Soule has cultivated healing plants and worked with them for medicine and wellness for more than four decades. Her wisdom comes with a gentle summons to mindfulness and a plea to embrace a broader awareness of nature’s cycles. She walks us through drying herbs for teas and infusions and guides us in making tinctures, vinegars, honeys, oils and more. Individual profiles of 18 healing plants dig deep into the history and properties of each, along with tips for growing and processing. Both practical and mystical, this is a beautiful, heartfelt guide to an ancient field of study that is experiencing renewed interest.

Directions

I almost let Hallie Bateman’s Directions slip past. What can I say? I’m a Taurus, and I don’t always love being told what to do, so affirmations in large quantities make me queasy. But once I started paging through this colorful, scrappy little book, I couldn’t stop, and I might have even smiled. A few personal faves:

“Dance and encourage dancing but don’t force anyone to dance.” 

“Apply lotion regularly and generously. Get old anyway.”

“Conjure specialness from thin air. Invent holidays, traditions, and surprises. (Duck Day, Ice Cream Tuesday, etc.)”

This would be a fun one to leave by the bed in a guest room or an Airbnb, since almost anyone will find a direction or two that resonates with them. Happily, Bateman’s book has prompted me to explore her larger body of work; her Instagram account is one to follow.

Simplicity at Home

I’ve been daydreaming about travel; haven’t we all? I yearn to wander a new city, to chance upon an exquisite shop where the artfully arranged goods and decor and lighting and background music all work in tandem to create an immersive experience. Yumiko Sekine’s shop in Tokyo, Fog Linen Work, would surely fit the bill, but for now we have Simplicity at Home, which presents Sekine’s “joyful minimalist” way of living and thoughtful devotion to reusing, repairing and creating harmony with the seasons. The pages are filled with neutrals, spare arrangements of housewares like small ceramic bowls and wooden spoons, neatly folded cloths, bright bunches of vegetables, tiny seeds on white plates, a clutch of flowering branches in a clear glass jar—and of course, delicately rumpled linen for days. If home is a bit suffocating lately, take a trip through this book, make some cold noodles for lunch, fold your socks and breathe.

This month’s selection of the best new lifestyles titles offers gentle reminders to connect to the earth, ask for directions and breathe.

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