Summer is the season for gardening, and it’s also the time to read the best new gardening books. There’s something delightful about finding a comfortable spot outdoors and reading a great book. It’s one of the joys that makes summer special.
This year we have a bountiful crop of great new gardening books for summer reading. So, pour a cold glass of lemonade, pull up a chair and get lost in the best new gardening books for summer reading.
Editor’s Note: Home Garden and Homestead is a proud member of the Amazon Associates Program. We earn a small commission (at no cost to you) when you click on a link and make a purchase. Thanks for supporting our website!
The Urban Garden
In cities and towns across America (and the world), urban gardeners grow plants of all kinds in whatever space they have available. The Urban Garden is a book for anyone who gardens in limited space. Authors Kathy Jentz and Teri Speight both have roots in the Washington, DC area, and their new book contains 101 ways to grow food and beauty in any city.
Want to grow beautiful flowers or delicious vegetables? The Urban Garden has tips, information, and photos that will help make you a better gardener. Some of the topics covered include:
- How to install planting pockets on fences and walls
- Tips for designing small gardens that feel spacious
- How to design a pet-friendly urban yard
- Vines and climbing plants to add privacy and reduce noise
- Building a salad table for growing lettuce and greens
- And much more.
Buy The Urban Garden on Amazon.
¡Verdura! – Living a Garden Life
Here’s another of the best new gardening books for summer reading. This wonderful book celebrates the power of green with 30 simple gardening projects that promote health living with plants.
Perla Sofía Curbelo-Santiago is a Puerto Rican author and gardening celebrity. Her website, Agrochic.com, is a Spanish-language gardening lifestyle platform. This new book (available in English and Spanish editions) was born of Perla’s lifelong love of nature, plants, and gardening.
Verdura means “greenery” in Spanish, and the word also refers to any edible plant from the garden. Throughout her delightful book, verdura is used as both a description and an aspiration. This book is all about adding more verdura to your daily life.
Verdura! Is great for beginners and expert gardeners alike. The 30 gardening projects found in the book include indoor and outdoor projects, many of which are perfect for small spaces and urban environments. Perla offers clear step-by-step guidance on project creation.
Some of the projects you’ll find inside include:
- Creating a container planting that appeals to your inner child
- Making a meditation garden or a private healing nook
- The joys of planting a barefoot garden
- Performing a quick and easy garden makeover
- Upcycling common discards to create a propagation station, a swinging planter, and a birdbath
If you’re the kind of gardener who likes lots of plant choices, check out the alternative plant charts. Plus, each section begins with a small glimpse of gardening life on the island of Puerto Rico.
A unique and captivating book. Buy Verdura! on Amazon.
The Vegetable Garden Problem Solver Handbook
Sometimes you need someone to tell you what’s happening to your vegetable garden plants. From battling blight on your tomatoes to losing your basil to downy mildew, you need a little expert help.
In The Vegetable Garden Problem Solver Handbook, author Susan Mulvihill (of YouTube’s “Susan’s in the Garden”) is ready to solve your vegetable garden problems. Need to stand firm against plant diseases, viruses, disorders, stressors, and even animal pests? Susan will solve your garden problem—without using harsh synthetic chemical products.
Use Susan’s advice to get your plants off to a healthy start. Then turn to this book to find out how to properly identify plant pathogens. Do you know how to troubleshoot problems like pollination issues and weather-related disorders? It’s in the book, too. Along with info about how to prevent ailments such as fruit cracking, leaf roll, blossom end rot and more.
The Vegetable Garden Problem Solver Handbook is a 2024 American Horticultural Society Book Award Winner for good reason. This is a book you will refer to multiple times every year.
Buy The Vegetable Garden Problem Solver Handbook on Amazon.
Dry Climate Gardening
I can’t include all the wonderful books about regional gardening in this story about the best new gardening books for summer reading. (Trust me, Amazon sells them all.) But since I lived in New Mexico for many years and now spend time in Arizona, I wanted to personally recommend Dry Climate Gardening by Noelle Johnson.
Noelle is a garden designer in the Phoenix area. She is also known as the AZ Plant Lady because she’s an expert on the colorful, vibrant, and tough plants that thrive in hot, low-water conditions. Her latest book won a 2024 American Horticultural Society Book Award because, quite frankly, it’s a terrific book.
Gardening in an arid climate has gone far beyond the “yard full of gravel with a few random cacti” look. By choosing the right native and adapted plants and using them with an eye for desert design, Noelle shows you how to establish a low-water landscape that’s an oasis for humans and wildlife.
This book includes information and photos on the best plants to feature in a dry climate landscape. She also includes insightful plant care techniques specific to dry climates, including pruning and fertilizing. Plus, this book includes plant info and charts for every category of plant, including trees, shrubs, groundcovers, succulents, and more.
In Dry Climate Gardening, you’ll learn how to do be a water-wise gardener with care and style. Buy Dry Climate Gardening on Amazon.
Epic Homesteading
The Epic Homestead where Kevin Espiritu lives and gardens is a modest lot in a suburban neighborhood in San Diego replete with solar panels, a 5,700-gallon water catchment system, 17 raised bed gardens, and edible food everywhere you turn.
Espiritu is all about knowing where his food comes from. And not being completely dependent on the local grocery store for fresh produce. He is living proof that you don’t have to move to the country and buy 10 acres to be a successful homesteader.
In Epic Homesteading, Espiritu shares his enthusiasm and willingness to experiment. He writes passionately about soil building, irrigation systems, “mini livestock” (a.k.a. chickens), growing food, and how to preserve your harvests. Each topic is illustrated with terrific photographs and easy-to-read explanations.
This is a great book for inspiration and practical advice. Buy Epic Homesteading on Amazon.
Sustainable Food Gardens
What makes a garden sustainable? Robert Kourik, author of Sustainable Food Gardens, quotes a United Nations commission: “sustainability meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” Using this definition as a springboard, Kourik has written the most comprehensive book about sustainable food gardening (and homestead growing) we’ve ever seen.
Make no mistake about it. This book is not a coffee table book filled with gorgeous garden photos. This is a how-to manual filled with all facets of information about growing food. Science geeks will love this book, and so will anyone who is serious about growing food in gardens and homesteads—and even on rooftops.
Robert Kourik is a treasure trove of information about green manures, gray-water systems, beneficial insects, healthy soil, and virtually every aspect of food gardening.
Buy Sustainable Food Gardens on Amazon.
Edible Houseplants
Byron and Laurelynn Martin have made a career of growing exotic and tropical houseplants. Their retail business—Logee’s Greenhouses in Danielson, Connecticut—is a destination for plant collectors and garden nerds. They also operate a successful online plant store at www.logees.com that offers an impressive variety of plants for homes and gardens.
In their new book, Edible Houseplants, the Martins have created a colorful guide to growing tasty fruits and delightful tropical plants indoors in containers. They take a deep dive into growing 46 tasty plants including lemons, limes, cherries, coffee, vanilla, cherries, papaya, and much more.
This book is full of color photos and complete care guidelines for all 46 featured plant varieties. It’s perfect for beginning gardeners as well as experts who are looking for delicious alternatives to ordinary houseplants. For gardeners with some outdoor space such as a patio or balcony, the Martins’ advice for growing fruiting plants in containers will open up new gardening possibilities.
Buy Edible Houseplants on Amazon.
Mini Meadows
What makes a book one of the best new gardening books for summer reading? In Mini Meadows by Mike Lizotte, it’s taking a familiar topic and putting a completely new spin on it.
Mike Lizotte wants you to rethink what a meadow is. Most people hear the word meadow and picture a large, grassy expanse of land sprinkled with wildflowers. That’s one kind of meadow, to be sure. But according to Lizotte, a meadow can be any size of flower garden that is informal in design, comprised of many kinds of flowering plants and is started from seed.
That means virtually any property can have a meadow garden. Create a mini meadow in a flower bed in front of the house or in the neglected land behind the garage. Or, plant a mini meadow in a raised bed or even in the “inferno strip” between the street and the sidewalk.
The author answers most questions about planting a meadow, including:
- Evaluating your planting site
- Annual wildflowers vs. perennial wildflowers
- When to plant
- How much seed to sow
- Planting for pollinators and wildlife
- Drought tolerant and deer-resistant meadow flowers
Mike Lizotte, also known as “The Seed Man,” is the co-owner of American Meadows, a company that sells a wide variety of wildflower seeds including regional seed mixes. This book is packed full of helpful information, and the photographs (by Rob Cardillo) make Mini Meadows a pleasure to peruse.
The Monarch: Saving Our Most-Loved Butterfly
Everyone loves butterflies, right? According to author Kylee Baumle, the monarch is the most beloved butterfly of them all. The subject matter and beautiful presentation makes The Monarch one of the best books for summer reading.
The Monarch achieves the perfect balance scientific information, colorful photos and fun facts about these wonderful “winged jewels” of nature. Baumle is delightfully obsessed with monarch butterflies. Her love for these insects is part of the reason this book is so special.
Baumle shares plenty of tips on how to protect these butterflies, whose population has been declining in recent years due to pesticides and loss of habitat. Do you want to create a monarch butterfly garden in your yard? Want to know what butterflies need to thrive? Would you like to attract butterflies to your garden and watch the complete lifecycle of monarchs? It’s all in the book.
Kids, teenagers, and adults will delight in the photographs, the butterfly facts and the practical advice about the plants that monarchs love. The Monarch: Saving Our Most-Loved Butterfly is a great addition to any gardener’s library.
Thank you for including our book! Teri and I hope it inspires and encourages many new and veteran gardeners out there.