40 books like The Pot Book

By Julie Holland,

Here are 40 books that The Pot Book fans have personally recommended if you like The Pot Book. Shepherd is a community of 11,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

Shepherd is reader supported. When you buy books, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Book cover of The Emperor Wears No Clothes: Hemp and the Marijuana Conspiracy

Robyn Griggs Lawrence Author Of The Cannabis Kitchen Cookbook: Feel-Good Edibles, from Tinctures and Cocktails to Entrées and Desserts

From my list on for people who are curious about cannabis.

Why am I passionate about this?

I discovered cannabis as good medicine in 2009, when my gynecologist recommended it for severe dysmenorrhea. When I couldn’t find a cookbook offering healthy, sophisticated cannabis-infused recipes, I decided to write one. As an amazing group of cannabis chefs taught me how to cook with cannabis and shared their recipes, I fell in love with the plant as well as the open-hearted community that supports it. I followed the Cannabis Kitchen Cookbook, published in 2015, with Pot in Pans: A History of Eating Cannabis, a textbook tracing the plant’s culinary history to ancient Persian and India, in 2019. I’ve learned how to grow my own, and I write regularly about cannabis trends and liberation.

Robyn's book list on for people who are curious about cannabis

Robyn Griggs Lawrence Why did Robyn love this book?

I came of age during the “just say no” ‘80s, and I didn’t know any better until this book, published in 1985, opened my eyes to the hypocrisy, greed, and racism behind the drug war. Here, an early cannabis liberation advocate, who has a popular strain named after him, shows how valuable the plant has been throughout history as food, fiber, and medicine and explains how it came to be vilified and outlawed. He was so committed to spreading the truth that he published the entire book online.

By Jack Herer,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Emperor Wears No Clothes as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.


Book cover of Smoke Signals: A Social History of Marijuana - Medical, Recreational and Scientific

Robyn Griggs Lawrence Author Of The Cannabis Kitchen Cookbook: Feel-Good Edibles, from Tinctures and Cocktails to Entrées and Desserts

From my list on for people who are curious about cannabis.

Why am I passionate about this?

I discovered cannabis as good medicine in 2009, when my gynecologist recommended it for severe dysmenorrhea. When I couldn’t find a cookbook offering healthy, sophisticated cannabis-infused recipes, I decided to write one. As an amazing group of cannabis chefs taught me how to cook with cannabis and shared their recipes, I fell in love with the plant as well as the open-hearted community that supports it. I followed the Cannabis Kitchen Cookbook, published in 2015, with Pot in Pans: A History of Eating Cannabis, a textbook tracing the plant’s culinary history to ancient Persian and India, in 2019. I’ve learned how to grow my own, and I write regularly about cannabis trends and liberation.

Robyn's book list on for people who are curious about cannabis

Robyn Griggs Lawrence Why did Robyn love this book?

Published in 2012, before cannabis liberation had truly begun to take hold, this is a lively look at the illicit cannabis market as it’s morphing into a legitimate industry. Irreverent and richly written, this book tells it like it is, tracing the racist roots of marijuana prohibition to its popularity among Mexican immigrants and jazz musicians and teasing out the vast implications of the US government’s attempts to eradicate it. Everyone needs to know this history, whether they enjoy cannabis or not.

By Martin A. Lee,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Smoke Signals as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

“Hallelujah and glory be to Smoke Signals, Martin Lee’s bodacious new book…Lee chronicles everything and everyone worth chronicling in the annals of marijuana” (High Times).

This is the great American pot story, a dramatic social exploration of a plant that sits at the nexus of political, legal, medical, and scientific discourse. From its ancient origins, to its cutting-edge therapeutic benefits, to its role in a culture war that has never ceased, marijuana has evolved beyond its own illicit subculture into a dynamic, multibillion-dollar industry. Since 1996, when California voters approved Proposition 215, dozens of state and local governments across the…


Book cover of Marijuana Grower's Handbook: Your Complete Guide for Medical and Personal Marijuana Cultivation

Robyn Griggs Lawrence Author Of The Cannabis Kitchen Cookbook: Feel-Good Edibles, from Tinctures and Cocktails to Entrées and Desserts

From my list on for people who are curious about cannabis.

Why am I passionate about this?

I discovered cannabis as good medicine in 2009, when my gynecologist recommended it for severe dysmenorrhea. When I couldn’t find a cookbook offering healthy, sophisticated cannabis-infused recipes, I decided to write one. As an amazing group of cannabis chefs taught me how to cook with cannabis and shared their recipes, I fell in love with the plant as well as the open-hearted community that supports it. I followed the Cannabis Kitchen Cookbook, published in 2015, with Pot in Pans: A History of Eating Cannabis, a textbook tracing the plant’s culinary history to ancient Persian and India, in 2019. I’ve learned how to grow my own, and I write regularly about cannabis trends and liberation.

Robyn's book list on for people who are curious about cannabis

Robyn Griggs Lawrence Why did Robyn love this book?

This is the home grower’s bible, written by an OG. Everything you could ever want to know about growing cannabis—but didn’t know to ask—is packed into these 500 pages, and the photos are pure plant porn. Before Rosenthal walks you through the growing process, from garden design to post-harvest, he provides a comprehensive guide to the cannabis plant and how it grows. This book gave me the confidence to grow my own medicine, and that changed my life.

By Ed Rosenthal,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Marijuana Grower's Handbook as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Ed Rosenthal's legacy handbook contains the foundational knowledge, tools, and methods to enable you to grow great marijuana—inside and out. 

All aspects of cultivation are covered, from the selection of varieties, setting up of the garden, through each stage of plant growth all the way to harvesting. Use efficient technology and save time, labor, and energy. Photographs throughout clarify instructions and show the stunning results possible by following Ed's growing advice.

This classic guide was groundbreaking when it was first released in 2010. For the very latest in technologies, tips, and techniques, including advances in LED lighting, garden design, genetics,…


Book cover of The Lotus and the Bud: Cannabis, Consciousness, and Yoga Practice

Robyn Griggs Lawrence Author Of The Cannabis Kitchen Cookbook: Feel-Good Edibles, from Tinctures and Cocktails to Entrées and Desserts

From my list on for people who are curious about cannabis.

Why am I passionate about this?

I discovered cannabis as good medicine in 2009, when my gynecologist recommended it for severe dysmenorrhea. When I couldn’t find a cookbook offering healthy, sophisticated cannabis-infused recipes, I decided to write one. As an amazing group of cannabis chefs taught me how to cook with cannabis and shared their recipes, I fell in love with the plant as well as the open-hearted community that supports it. I followed the Cannabis Kitchen Cookbook, published in 2015, with Pot in Pans: A History of Eating Cannabis, a textbook tracing the plant’s culinary history to ancient Persian and India, in 2019. I’ve learned how to grow my own, and I write regularly about cannabis trends and liberation.

Robyn's book list on for people who are curious about cannabis

Robyn Griggs Lawrence Why did Robyn love this book?

My friend Chris Kilham, an ethnobotanist, medicine hunter, and yoga master, discovered decades ago that thoughtful ganja intake can enhance yoga practice and pave the way for a life of peace, health, and well-being. This book offers an in-depth guide to blending yoga with cannabis as well as a killer sequence of cannabis-enhanced postures and instructions for breathwork and meditation practice. I refer to this book again and again.

By Christopher S. Kilham,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Lotus and the Bud as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

An in-depth guide to blending the practice of yoga with cannabis

* Examines the physical, mental, spiritual, and energetic effects of cannabis and yoga, including their effects on the nervous system and chakras

* Explains how yoga practice offers a way to tune the human nervous system and how, through the endocannabinoid system, cannabis harmonizes a multitude of functions, from respiration to pain control, in ways that enhance yoga

* Offers an illustrated sequence of cannabis-yoga asanas (postures) developed to awaken kundalini, open energy channels, accelerate healing, and unlock access to unbounded states of consciousness

In India, both yoga and…


Book cover of Pharmako/Poeia: Plant Powers, Poisons, and Herbcraft

Jon Crabb Author Of Graven Images: The Art of the Woodcut

From my list on for any uber-hip, hard to impress bookworms.

Why am I passionate about this?

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been obsessed with cultural curiosities, extraordinary eccentrics, secret societies, decadent dandies, rebels, devils, and anything weird and wonderful. I parlayed a love of Word and Image into a career in the arts and worked for places including Tate, Thames & Hudson and the British Library. But to be honest with you, that was just a ruse so I could spend more time delving through interesting books and prints. Some people see the world a little differently; I think we all benefit by spending a bit of time in the company of their art. "It's the Ones Who've Cracked That the Light Shines Through."

Jon's book list on for any uber-hip, hard to impress bookworms

Jon Crabb Why did Jon love this book?

This is the first volume of a trilogy on psychoactive plants and synthetic drugs. While this is a well-worn path, I’ve never seen it traversed quite like this. Pendell weaves together science, alchemy, illustrations, poetry, and quotations to reveal the spirit behind each molecule he discusses. The sections on stimulants are the longest and most enthusiastic, while the hallucinogens are given the most whimsical prose. It’s a fascinating treatment of a fascinating subject. Some will hate it, but the right person will love it.

By Dale Pendell,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Pharmako/Poeia as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

***This paperback edition has a new introduction by the author and updated content.

This is the first volume of North Atlantic Books’ updated paperback edition of Dale Pendell’s Pharmako trilogy, an encyclopedic study of the history and uses of psychoactive plants and related synthetics first published between 1995 and 2005. The books form an interrelated suite of works that provide the reader with a unique, reliable, and often personal immersion in this medically, culturally, and spiritually fascinating subject. All three books are beautifully designed and illustrated, and are written with unparalleled authority, erudition, playfulness, and range.

Pharmako/Poeia: Plant Powers, Poisons,…


Book cover of The Earthwise Herbal, Volume II: A Complete Guide to New World Medicinal Plants

Matthew and Julie Author Of Backyard Medicine: Harvest and Make Your Own Herbal Remedies

From my list on practical herbalism and foraging.

Why are we passionate about this?

As writers, we believe that if you have something wonderful to say it needs a beautiful book to say it in. In writing six books together, in the area of herbal medicine and foraging, we have been lucky to find publishers who share our beliefs. How it works is that Julie is our qualified herbalist and a photographer, layout, and typesetting specialist, while Matthew is a professional editor, writer, and compulsive compiler of bibliographies and indexes. Our USP is that we insist each plant deserves a recipe or two, and that we feature many forgotten wild plants from the old herbals that we love to bring back to life.

Matthew's book list on practical herbalism and foraging

Matthew and Julie Why did Matthew love this book?

We think this is Matthew’s masterwork, forming the most thorough and sensitive contemporary herbal in English. When we say ‘sensitive’ we are referencing Matthew’s intuitive understanding of a herb’s specific qualities, or virtues.

He combines this feeling for a plant’s individuality with a thorough knowledge of the way it has been favoured in traditional herbal medicine and how he has used it himself, quoting from cases arising in his long clinical experience. A proponent of ‘drop dosing’ or using the least amount of herb necessary, he is often surprising, sometimes controversial, but always well-informed and elegant in his work.

By Matthew Wood,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Earthwise Herbal, Volume II as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.


Book cover of The Secret Teachings of Plants: The Intelligence of the Heart in the Direct Perception of Nature

Liz Koch Author Of Stalking Wild Psoas: Embodying Your Core Intelligence

From my list on re-wilding our relationship with life.

Why am I passionate about this?

As both an international somatic educator and conceptual artist, I have explored direct perception through the sensory system for over 45 years. Focusing on human potential and core awareness through the portal of the neuro-core tissue called Psoas, I am the author of The Psoas Book and Core Awareness: Enhancing Yoga, Pilates, Exercise and Dance. I have come to appreciate that fostering personal integrity requires changing our language of the body from an object to a dynamic living process. To restore our core coherency, humans must wake up from our mechanistic separateness to once again be innovative organisms dancing in reciprocity with a living, dynamic Earth.

Liz's book list on re-wilding our relationship with life

Liz Koch Why did Liz love this book?

This book offers a response to a deep longing to be in the world with childlike curiosity. It encourages our direct perception of life through the energetic heart field. Although it is meant as a knowledgeable guide for listening to and communicating with plants, it elicits a poignant call during a time of profound alienation. Encouraging the letting go of top-down linear thinking, Buhner offers a step-by-step somatic path for decolonizing the soul. I discovered by exchanging the word “psoas” for “plant” the book easily becomes a personal guide for increasing our core awareness as it inspires opening the heart by rooting into a reciprocal relationship with the living Earth. To me, re-wilding my relationship with the deepest aspects of self is vitally personal and imperative if all life is to truly flourish. 

By Stephen Harrod Buhner,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Secret Teachings of Plants as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

All ancient and indigenous peoples insisted their knowledge of plant medicines came from the plants themselves and not through trial-and-error experimentation. Less well known is that many Western peoples made this same assertion. There are, in fact, two modes of cognition available to all human beings--the brain-based linear and the heart-based holistic. The heart-centered mode of perception can be exceptionally accurate and detailed in its information gathering capacities if, as indigenous and ancient peoples asserted, the heart's ability as an organ of perception is developed. Author Stephen Harrod Buhner explores this second mode of perception in great detail through the…


Book cover of Hatfield's Herbal: The Curious Stories of Britain's Wild Plants

Jane Struthers Author Of Red Sky at Night: The Book of Lost Countryside Wisdom

From my list on to take you into another world.

Why am I passionate about this?

I have always tuned into the atmosphere of places. Sometimes this is a joy and sometimes it’s a very different experience, but either way, it’s a fundamental part of me. It spills over into my work, too, because each of the thirty-odd non-fiction books I’ve written has its own strong atmosphere. I was particularly aware of this while writing Red Sky at Night, as I wanted to evoke a sense of the past informing the present, whether that means planting a shrub to keep witches away from your front door or baking what I still think is one of the best fruit cakes ever.

Jane's book list on to take you into another world

Jane Struthers Why did Jane love this book?

Plants are our companions through life. We grow, pick and eat some of them, but how much do we really value them? Our ancestors had an intimate knowledge and understanding of the power of plants and were aware of which were helpful and which caused harm. They wrapped comfrey leaves around the damaged legs of animals, believed that fairies sheltered from the rain beneath ragwort plants, cured childhood hernias with the aid of ash saplings, and recognized the benefits of rosehips long before science could analyse their nutrients.

Hatfield’s Herbal follows the tradition of so many other excellent herbals, weaving botany, plant magic, medicine, and folklore into an engrossing mixture that always keeps me reading long after I found what I was originally looking for. Read a good herbal and you’ll never look at a so-called weed in the same way again.

By Gabrielle Hatfield,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Hatfield's Herbal as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Hatfield's Herbal is the story of how people all over Britain have used its wild plants throughout history, for reasons magical, mystical and medicinal. Gabrielle Hatfield has drawn on a lifetime's knowledge to describe the properties of over 150 native plants, and the customs that surround them: from predicting the weather with seaweed to using deadly nightshade to make ladies' pupils dilate appealingly, and from ensuring a husband's faithfulness with butterbur to warding off witches by planting a rowan tree. Filled with stories, folklore and remedies both strange and practical, this is a memorable and eye-opening guide to the richness…


Book cover of The Korean Herbal Apothecary: Ancient Wisdom for Wellness and Balance in the Modern World

Dawna Pitts Author Of Entertaining Is My Love Language

From my list on for inspiration when entertaining at home.

Why am I passionate about this?

My name is Dawna Pitts. I am passionate about entertaining and always have been. I realized I actually have much to share from my experiences of entertaining for many years and living on different continents which made me write my book Entertaining is My Love Language. I wanted to inspire people to have more get-togethers in our homes build sweet, delicious memories, and understand home entertaining doesn’t always have to be proper and perfect and no need to be intimidated by foreign exotic food ingredients.

Dawna's book list on for inspiration when entertaining at home

Dawna Pitts Why did Dawna love this book?

This book was given to me by my mum after she read it on the plane from Seoul to visit me here. She is an advocate health/food person, to say the least, and she always tries to help me to stay in a healthier food lifestyle.

I am a Korean American, was born in Korea and lived there until I was 14, lived in Australia for 8 years, and have been living in America for going on 25 years now. Even though I have been in the States for the longest part of my life, my food core very much has Korean roots in it.

Korean food starts with ingredients that has certain health benefits to us and we try to make it taste good to eat. American food starts with what tastes good and we make it more tastier to eat. Having an American husband and a son who…

By Grace Yoon,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Korean Herbal Apothecary as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Korean women are expected to reach a record average lifespan of over 90 years by 2030. In this first-of-its kind guide, discover their culture's ancient healing methods and remedies.

How has the Korean culture, now being looked at as a new Blue Zone, created such incredible wellness and longevity? An examination of their healing traditions may provide some actionable answers. Grace Yoon, Founder of Qi Alchemy, delivers just this with The Korean Herbal Apothecary, the first book to focus specifically on Korean herbalism and ancestral healing practices. She reveals healing traditions that have been used for generations, handed down grandmother…


Book cover of The Primal Scream

Tony Sandy Author Of Observations from Another Planet

From my list on the struggle to be yourself in a crazy world.

Why am I passionate about this?

My passion and subsequent expertise in this subject have followed years of self-study and reading. I have tried to make sense of the conflicting views that the world has thrown at me, confusing me by each claiming to be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth (the seller's marketplace). The books in this series, reflect how difficult it is to be yourself and how much courage it takes to break free of your conditioning, parental or societal. It covers the necessary breakdown of the internal personality, so that a new you can emerge from the cocoon of the reassembled old you, butterfly-like.

Tony's book list on the struggle to be yourself in a crazy world

Tony Sandy Why did Tony love this book?

Art Janov's book, The Primal Scream and its follow-up Primal Therapy, provided a means of breaking down the walls of this mental prison, by expressing the sheer sense of helplessness you feel when the world is presented to you as a screaming baby. In my case this was the stunned silence that I later learned was autism and the little professor syndrome, which meant keeping your eyes open and your mouth shut, in order to understand the strange interplay I saw expressed before me. Meaningless shouting and screaming at the frustration of what I faced was a new experience for me.

By Arthur Janov,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Primal Scream as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

A psychologist describes a new form of therapy that forces patients to relive childhood experiences


5 book lists we think you will like!

Interested in therapy, cannabis, and herbs?

11,000+ authors have recommended their favorite books and what they love about them. Browse their picks for the best books about therapy, cannabis, and herbs.

Therapy Explore 16 books about therapy
Cannabis Explore 22 books about cannabis
Herbs Explore 16 books about herbs