100 books like Soil

The book, which I first read as an assignment in a college class, was my first introduction to both personal narrative and nature writing, and I was hooked. I decided right then and there that I wanted to explore the natural world and write about it when I grew up.

I was—and still am—enamored by Williams’s descriptions of wild birds, the desert landscape around Great Salt Lake, and the solace she derived from the natural world as she faced her mother’s and grandmother’s illnesses. Williams’ lyrical writing and deep knowledge of and love for her home landscape are a constant source of inspiration for my own writing and living.

Until I discovered this book in my early twenties, most of my reading about the natural world had come from male writers who encountered that world in a spirit of discovery and domination.

Dillard’s relationship with the creek she visited seemingly daily was a different approach entirely—she came as an acolyte, ready to watch, listen, and learn what the wild things of that stream had to teach her. Her writing is introspective and contemplative, and it swings wildly between esoteric readings and embodied experiences on the ground, creating a breathless, mind-body reading experience.

After the birth of my second and third children (twins!), I felt further than ever from my dreams of being a nature writer. Even the natural world outside my window seemed impossibly far away while I was indoors, contending with the demands of two babies and a preschooler.

When those babies were about two years old, I discovered, by accident, this book, and my life changed. In its pages, Louise Erdrich showed that careful attention to and contemplation of the natural world was not only possible for mothers of small children but that motherhood itself can make us more attuned to nature, more empathetic, and more clear-eyed and fierce.

A friend gave me a copy of this book when my kids were small, and it was my first indication that there is life after kids, my first glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. Over the course of the book and several years of their lives, Ross, her husband, and their two kids hiked the Continental Divide Trail, beginning with the Colorado Trail portion when the kids were one and three years old.

Reading this book planted the first seed in my mind that, one day, my husband and I would revisit the Colorado Trail, which we’d hiked five years before our first son was born, with our three kids in tow. It took us until they were 11 and 15, but we did it!

I am inspired by this lovely story! When Lydia Grace finds herself going to the city to live with her grumpy uncle during hard times, she seeks to find a way to make him smile. Having had a few ‘challenging people’ in my own life who I tried to cajole out of their funky moods, I love how her indomitable spirit and love of gardening cheers those around her, all while she makes a wonderful surprise out of the very little that she has. It shows that beauty can be found – or planted – in the most unexpected places.

I’ve been recommending Brian Capon’s Botany for Gardeners to my gardening students for years. Unlike your typical botany textbook, it’s written expressly for gardeners, which means it presents all you need to know about botany if you are a gardener, not a scientist or a botany student. The presentation is clear, concise, and conversational, so it feels like learning about botany from a friend…a really smart friend! This book will either take you as far as you need to go in botany, or it will open you up to the world of botany and inspire you to learn more. 

In 2007 I worked in two gardens in the UK: Rosemoor, a Royal Horticultural Society garden in Devon, and London’s Chelsea Physic Garden. I was smitten by the miniature rock plants, displayed in pots in the gravel bed of Rosemoor’s Alpine House, and set into the odd, antique Pond Rockery at the Physic Garden. Shulman’s glib, tiny book reminds me of those jewel-like plantings. It focuses on the founding father of British alpine gardening, Reginald Farrer, a plant collector, writer, and swashbuckling adventurer. His method for seeding his cliffside garden in the Yorkshire Dales was my favorite episode; he loaded his gun with seeds he had collected in the Himalayas, took aim at the cliff, and pulled the trigger. Note: I haven’t tried this at home.

This tour de force of a book is a profound and illuminating meditation on what Orwell’s simple act of planting seven roses can mean, in terms of questions about who we are and how we spend our life. Solnit weaves together seamlessly stories of roses, nature, 20th-century revolutionary politics, literature, and people to reimagine how we might live a life with both beauty and justice. She writes with clarity, passion, and wisdom. Sprinkled throughout the book are thought-provoking reflections on a wide range of subjects: trees and their relationship to time, the fusion of avant-garde art theories and radical political ideas in Tina Modotti’s 1924 photograph Roses, Mexico; the political and cultural implications of one’s identity; the inhumane treatment of workers in the flower industry in Columbia; and what it is that we love when we love flowers, just to name a few. It’s a heady but… show more.

The Vanderbeekers and the Hidden Garden is about the magic of standing up for something you believe in, and discovering unexpected supporters.

With echoes of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden. In the Vanderbeeker family, everyone might have different goals, talents, opinions, and personalities, but they all stick together when it counts. (Similar to Elizabeth Enright’s The Saturdays, Noel Streatfield’s Ballet Shoes, and Jeanne Birdsall’s The Penderwicks).

These series are perfect to read alone or as a family read-aloud, because everyone will find a character to relate to.

The Busy Busy Day is a lovely picture book that gently allows the children to discover for themselves the different indications that spring has arrived. I like the way it highlights the importance of caring for and appreciating nature even if it is in our own back garden. 

The illustrations are beautiful. I am always in awe of Daniel Howarth’s illustrations and have been lucky enough for him to have illustrated some of my own books. The clever way he illustrates the different characters showing their emotions makes them come to life on the page. You can laugh along with the children as Ginger the Cat and Floppy the Rabbit get into a muddle whilst gardening.