Garden History

Mark Kurlansky, winner of the James Beard Award for Excellence in Food Writing, leads us on a mouthwatering culinary tour around the world and through history and culture from the fifth century B.C. to the present day. This wonderful collection contains essays by Plato on the art of cooking, Pablo Neruda on french fries, and many other writers on the passions of cuisine.

In the ninth installment of Lauren Willig's bestselling Pink Carnation series, an atrocious poet teams up with an American widow to prevent Napoleon's invasion of England. Secret agent Augustus Whittlesby has spent a decade undercover in France, posing as an insufferably bad poet. The French...

The Mystery of the Hanging Garden of Babylon is an exciting story of detection involving legends, expert decipherment of ancient texts, and a vivid description of a little-known civilization. Recognized in ancient times as one of the Seven Wonders of the World, the legendary Hanging Garden of Babylon and its location still remains a mystery steeped in shadow and puzzling myths. In this remarkable volume Stephanie Dalley, a world expert on ancient Babylonian language, gathers for the first time all the material on this enigmatic World Wonder.

Having conquered the world's taste buds and established itself as a staple in our daily lives, coffee has mirrored the moods and movements of society for centuries - yet, how much do we know about its history? In his riveting new book, A Short History of Coffee, Gordon Kerr investigates the fascinating history behind the global obsession with coffee, from its Ethiopian origins, the legends, myths, geographical locations and somewhat eccentric characters that have helped make it the staple that it is today.

Mark Kurlansky's first global food history since the best-selling Cod and Salt; the fascinating cultural, economic and culinary story of milk and all things dairy - with recipes throughout. According to the Greek creation myth, we are so much spilt milk; a splatter of the goddess Hera's breast milk became our galaxy, the Milky Way.

Immerse yourself in stories of these useful plants, from herb gardens to remote wildernesses. Herbs have been used by humans throughout history - for cooking, medicine, rituals, and more. They are also a huge part of the modern world, from gardening, food, and cosmetics to medicines fighting...

In this authoritative but light-hearted account of beers gone by, archaeologist Tate Paulette brings the famous "land between the rivers" back to life in vivid detail. We meet not only the beers of ancient Mesopotamia, but also the people who brewed them and drank them, the places where these people lived and worked, the taverns and temples and tombs where they did their drinking, the stories they told about beer, their preferred styles of drinking, their brewing equipment and drinking paraphernalia, the gods and goddesses who governed their lives and who were also partial to a drink.

How did a bar like P. J. Clarke’s saloon become the beloved watering hole for Frank Sinatra, Marilyn Monroe, Jacqueline Kennedy, Rocky Marciano, and Buddy Holly (not to mention the fictional Don Draper)? And what was it about their bacon cheeseburger that caused Nat King Cole to pronounce it "the Cadillac of burgers"? Established in 1884 and bought in l904 by Patrick "Paddy" Joseph Clarke, this Irish saloon in a beautiful Victorian building on the corner of Third Avenue and 55th Street has captivated generations of New Yorkers.

A heart-warming novel inspired by real life events, about the brave women during WWI who worked in the historic grounds of London's Kew Gardens. Can the women of Kew keep the gardens alive in the midst of war? London, 1916. England is at war. Desperate to help in whatever way they can, Ivy and...

An altogether different kind of book on English gardens—the first of its kind—a look at the history of England’s magnificent gardens as a history of Britain itself, from the seventeenth-century gardens of Charles II to those of Prince Charles today. In this rich, revelatory history, Sir...

She is someone’s darkest desire Playing the victim of a vampire king on an island off New Orleans is actress Avalon Morgan’s creepiest role to date. It’s also scary good fun—until the victim of a real killer is discovered on set, laid out for all to see. With production shut down, Avalon...

Explore the people, discoveries, and innovations that created the "water of life" in this compelling narrative.

In Top Dog, Maria Goodavage takes listeners into the life of Lucca K458, a decorated and highly skilled military working dog. An extraordinary bond developed between Lucca and Marine Corps handler Chris Willingham, launching what became a legendary 400-mission career. A Specialized Search Dog, Lucca belongs to an elite group trained to work off-leash at long distances from her handler.

The United States boasts a culturally and ethnically diverse population which makes for a continually changing culinary landscape. But a young historical gastronomist named Sarah Lohman discovered that American food is united by eight flavors: black pepper, vanilla, curry powder, chili powder, soy sauce, garlic, MSG, and Sriracha. In Eight Flavors, Lohman sets out to explore how these influential ingredients made their way to the American table.

Sunday Times Bestselling author of The Traitor of Colditz Robert Verkaik reveals the incredible never-before-told story of the role played by the Cambridge Spies in the British defeat at Arnhem 'A breath-taking review of WWII's greatest betrayal and the moment that changed history forever.'...

Food historian and chef Neil Buttery takes the listener on a journey exploring the creation, evolution and cultural importance of some of our most beloved baked foods, whether they be fit for a monarch's table, or served from the bakestone of a lowly farm labourer. This book charts innovations, happy accidents and some of the most downright bizarre baked foods ever created.

In this engaging, anecdotal history of food, world conquest, and desire, a chef-turned-journalist tells the story of three legendary cities, Venice, Lisbon, and Amsterdam, that transformed the globe in the quest for spice.

And a Bottle of Rum tells the raucously entertaining story of America as seen through the bottom of a drinking glass. With a chapter for each of 10 cocktails, Wayne Curtis reveals that the homely spirit once distilled from the industrial waste of the exploding sugar trade has managed to infiltrate every stratum of New World society. Curtis takes us from the taverns of the American colonies, to the plundering pirate ships off the coast of Central America, to the watering holes of pre-Castro Cuba, and to the kitsch-laden tiki bars of 1950s America.

In a tale as twisted as any spy thriller, discover how three women delivered critical evidence of Axis war crimes to Allied forces during World War II: “Mazzeo is a fascinating storyteller” (New York Journal of Books). In 1944, news of secret diaries kept by Italy's Foreign Minister...

As historian Mark Essig reveals in Lesser Beasts, swine have such a bad reputation for precisely the same reasons they are so valuable as a source of food: they are intelligent, self-sufficient, and omnivorous. What's more, he argues, we ignore our historic partnership with these astonishing animals at our peril.