I really need to keep up on what's happening at my alma mater! I just arrived home a short while ago, having had the unexpected and tremendous pleasure of hearing Amy Stewart speak. A short sidebar notice in the local paper the other night was how I found out that she was appearing at the college. For those who may not be familiar with her work (and if you like reading and gardening, you need to remedy that), she's written several best-selling books: "Flower Confidential" (a thorough exploration of the cut-flower industry), "From the Ground Up" (a memoir of the first garden she ever made) and her most recent book, "Wicked Plants" (anecdotes and information on poisonous plants). She is also familiar to legions of garden bloggers as part of the great "Garden Rant" blog.
Amy gave an overview of her books, but also discussed writing in general, which was wonderful. She's a natural speaker - energetic, funny, and passionate. She's also one of those fortunate writers who manages to tackle a subject head-on, acquire mountains of data, statistics and interviews - and then manages to distill it down into an informative book that doesn't read like a textbook. I don't know how she does it, but she does it brilliantly. If she wasn't such a nice person, I'm afraid I'd have to be bitterly envious of her! If you ever have the opportunity to hear Amy Stewart speak - do yourself a favor, drop everything and go. Definitely time well spent!
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