If you don't have a horticultural background, are too busy to take the master gardener program, and wonder about the nuts and bolts of gardening, read this book.

It is a practical book filled with the details of how to care for perennials, from cutting back to fertilizing, staking and dividing.The author thoroughly explains the how and when for all these techniques. Perhaps the most useful section is that of lengthy lists in the back that help you determine which perennials you do and don't want to grow, depending on your tolerance for maintenance and where you live, and which perennials are deer-resistant, have seedheads that attract song birds, are short-lived, need deadheading or lots of other categories thought up by this walking encyclopedia of a perennial expert.

Monty Don, host of the BBC-TV's Gardener's World and one of the United Kingdom's most respected gardening writers, he ventures far from home in this vivid account of gardens on all seven continents. Around the World in 80 Gardens visits the exotic floating gardens of the Amazon, magnificent Renaissance Italian water gardens, colorful alpine flower meadows in Norway, and Monet's world-famous Giverny, all brought to life in beautiful photographs. In his explorations of the often surprising horticulture in these and other locales, Don emphasizes context: as he puts it, "No garden is an island." Don applies that insight to the Dutch Het Loo, the tropical gardens of Thailand, and the intriguing fusion of indigenous and colonial garden cultures of Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.

'If I have learned only one thing from my travels around the world it is that no garden is an island. Context is everything.' Monty Don visits each continent in this landmark series on gardens of the world. We are introduced to the unique floating gardens of the Amazon and the colourful alpine flower meadows of Norway, modest domestic gardens in Havana and Bali, Monet's world-famous Giverny and the Dutch tour-de-force Het Loo, the formal magnificence of Renaissance Italian water gardens, the tropical planting traditions of Thailand, and the intriguing fusion of indigenous and colonial garden cultures in Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. Each garden is placed in context, horticultural preconceptions are abandoned and Monty is constantly surprised by the unexpected locations where gardens thrive. A vivid account of travel, adventure, beauty and the pursuit of knowledge.