Synopses & Reviews
Bill Alexander had no idea that his simple dream of having a vegetable garden and small orchard in his backyard would lead him into life-and-death battles with groundhogs, webworms, weeds, and weather; midnight expeditions in the dead of winter to dig up fresh thyme; and skirmishes with neighbors who feed the vermin (i.e., deer). Not to mention the vacations that had to be planned around the harvest, the near electrocution of the tree man, the limitations of his own middle-aged body, and the pity of his wife and kids. When Alexander runs (just for fun!) a costbenefit analysis, adding up everything from the live animal trap to the Velcro tomato wraps and then amortizing it over the life of his garden, it comes as quite a shock to learn that it cost him a staggering $64 to grow each one of his beloved Brandywine tomatoes. But as any gardener will tell you, you can't put a price on the unparalleled pleasures of providing fresh food for your family.
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"Gardening as extreme sport. . . . Engaging, well paced and informative."—The New York Times Book Review
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andquot;Engaging, funny, and down-to-earth.andquot;and#8212;Entertainment Weekly
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Both an inspiration and a cautionary tale for anyone who has ever looked at a tomato and thought, I could grow that!”—Life magazine Life Magazine
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and#8220;Nature is meant to be accommodated, not dominated, and
The $64 Tomatois William Alexanderand#8217;s insightful andoften hilarious voyage of that discovery. With self-deprecatingwit, he spins an engaging tale that teaches importantlessons as it entertains.and#8221;
and#8212;John Grogan, author of Marley andamp; Me
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"A wry memoir in which every reader who's spent way more to grow a plant than he could purchase it for at the supermarket will recognize his own successes, failures and foibles."—San Francisco Chronicle The San Francisco Chronicle
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“Nature is meant to be accommodated, not dominated, and
The $64 Tomato is William Alexander’s insightful and often hilarious voyage of that discovery. With self-deprecating wit, he spins an engaging tale that teaches important lessons as it entertains.”
—John Grogan, author of Marley & Me
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“William Alexander’s intelligent and funny memoir is a tribute to humankind’s irrepressible urge to cultivate the earth. His warm-hearted take on the domestic scene reminds us all that life began in a garden.”
—Katherine Whiteside, author Antique Flowers and Classic Bulbs
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"Money, sex, aging. That's real gardening!"—New York Observer The New York Observer
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"Engaging, funny, and down-to-earth."—Entertainment Weekly Entertainment Weekly
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The engaging tale of one man’s pursuit of the perfect kitchen garden, from its original construction, fraught with delays and construction troubles, to his cost-benefit analysis that reveals each tomato he raised set him back $64….This enjoyable book, laced with humor and Alexander’s garden philosophy, is highly recommended.” Library Journal
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“[A] hilarious horticultural memoir.…Alexander’s slightly poisoned paradise manages to impart an existential lesson on the interconnectedness of nature and the fine line between nurturing and killing.” Publishers Weekly
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"A refreshing take on the city-mouse-turns-country-mouse-and-lives-to-tell genre . . . Alexander's ability to elevate and expand his experience . . . reminds us that we have little control over the places obsession takes us—even the ones that seem most innocuous, such as a simple backyard vegetable patch."
—Newsday Newsday
Synopsis
Who knew that Bill Alexander's simple dream of having a vegetable garden and small orchard would lead him into life-and-death battles with webworms, weeds, and a groundhog named Superchuck? Over the course of his hilarious adventures, Alexander puzzles over why a six-thousand-volt wire doesn't deter deer but nearly kills his tree surgeon; encounters a gardener who bears an eerie resemblance to Christopher Walken; and stumbles across the aphrodisiac effects of pollen when he plays bumble bee to his apple blossoms.
When he decides (just for fun) to calculate how much it cost to grow one of his beloved Brandywine tomatoes, he comes up with a staggering $64. But as any gardener knows, you can't put a price tag on the rewards of homegrown produce, or on the lessons learned along the way.
About the Author
William Alexander, the author of two critically acclaimed books, lives in New York's Hudson Valley. By day the IT director at a research institute, he made his professional writing debut at the age of fifty-three with a national bestseller about gardening, The $64 Tomato. His second book, 52 Loaves, chronicled his quest to bake the perfect loaf of bread, a journey that took him to such far-flung places as a communal oven in Morocco and an abbey in France, as well as into his own backyard to grow, thresh, and winnow wheat. The Boston Globe called Alexander "wildly entertaining," the New York Times raved that "his timing and his delivery are flawless," and the Minneapolis Star Tribune observed that "the world would be a less interesting place without the William Alexanders who walk among us." A 2006 Quill Book Awards finalist, Alexander won a Bert Greene Award from the IACP for his article on bread, published in Saveur magazine. A passion bordering on obsession unifies all his writing. He has appeared on NPR's Morning Edition and at the National Book Festival in Washington DC and is a frequent contributor to the New York Times op-ed pages, where he has opined on such issues as the Christmas tree threatening to ignite his living room and the difficulties of being organic. Now, in Flirting with French, he turns his considerable writing talents to his perhaps less considerable skills: becoming fluent in the beautiful but maddeningly illogical French language.
Table of Contents
Contents
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Prologue: Gentleman Farmer 1
Whore in the Bedroom, Horticulturist in the Garden 3
We Know Where You Live 21
One Mans Weed Is Jean-Georgess Salad 47
No Such Thing as Organic Apples 75
You May Be Smarter, But Hes Got More Time 96
Nature Abhors a Meadow (But Loves a Good Fire) 131
Shell-Shocked: A Return to the Front (Burner) 146
Christopher Walken, Gardener 162
Cereal Killer 186
Statuary Rape 208
Harvest Jam 220
The Existentialist in the Garden 238
The $64 Tomato 247
Childbirth. Da Vinci. Potatoes. 256
Acknowledgments 267
Suggested Reading 269
Recipes for the Paperback Edition 271