The Backyard Parables: Lessons on Gardening, and Life

by Margaret Roach

Margaret Roach has been harvesting thirty years of backyard parables-deceptively simple, instructive stories from a life spent digging ever deeper-and has distilled them in this memoir along with her best tips for garden making, discouraging all manner of animal and insect opponents, at-home pickling, and more.


After ruminating on the bigger picture in her memoir And I Shall Have Some Peace There, Margaret Roach has returned to the garden, insisting as ever that we must garden with both our head and heart, or as she expresses it, with "horticultural how-to and woo-woo." In THE BACKYARD PARABLES, Roach uses her fundamental understanding of the natural world, philosophy, and life to explore the ways that gardening saved and instructed her, and meditates on the science and spirituality of nature, reminding her readers and herself to keep on digging.

Genres: Gardening, Nonfiction, Memoir, Nature, Self Help, Audiobook, Biography

288 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2013

About the author

"I garden because I cannot help myself," says Margaret Roach, and "The Backyard Parables" (January 2013) shares what she has learned about horticulture, and life, in the process of digging ever deeper. In December 2007, Roach walked away from New York City and her job as EVP/Editorial Director of Martha Stewart, because she craved other rewards: solitude, a return to the creativity of writing, and a closer connection to nature and her first passion, the garden she'd been making on weekends for 20 years. Roach moved to a rural New York town of 300, began AWayToGarden.com (called "the best garden blog" by the New York Times and named for her prize-winning 1998 book), and wrote the dropout memoir "And I Shall Have Some Peace There." She is the former garden editor of Newsday newspaper, and was an editor at the New York Times. Today she lectures, teaches and blogs about what she calls "horticultural how-to and woo-woo." (Erica Berger photo.)

Reviews

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Margaret Roach continues her autobiography anchored in her upstate New York garden. I first knew of Margaret from her thoughtful editor's letters in Martha Stewart Living magazine, then read of her exodus from the pressure cooker of NYC and MSLO in "And I Shall Have Some Peace There," having been entranced by her "A Way to Garden" book, which she continued on her website after leaving the corporate world.

Like much of her writing, this meanders all over the two-and-a-half acres which is its subject, but unlike much meandering writing, the byways are pleasant, and we see things we would not have seen had we stayed on topic or on the path. The scattery style takes some getting used to; Margaret Roach lives alone, and writes her internal monologue unchecked by a listener or editor to steer her back toward the original thread. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn't, but it is not unpleasant.

From nearly any other writer, I would have been exasperated after Winter (the book is divided into the four seasons and four corresponding elements), but knowing Margaret through her blog and books, I knew where we were headed and was content to tag along for the ramble through the garden and seasons, the growth, destruction, heartbreak, and promise of renewal that is working the earth.

One editing quibble I have are the incessant interruptions from "sidebars" which are not sidebars, but take up pages and interrupt the text. The information in them is important technical gardening information, but it's verbatim or nearly so from the blog. It would have been far more helpful to put these at the end of chapters or as appendices rather than breaking up the text in mid-thought and mid-sentence; Margaret does this herself enough without sidebars adding to it.

This isn't for everyone. Visit awaytogarden.com and if it speaks to you there, you'll enjoy this read.

[Janice · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Nature is no fool, nor does it suffer them; from it's mouth come utterances that we should not disregard because it sets the best example of life's rhythm." There are many jewels of wisdom in this tome that offers both good gardening advice, and the author's philosophy about life. There are sections on pruning, fertilizing, mulch, food preservation, planting a bird-friendly flower/shrub/tree garden, and many references to other authors and books. There are also comments about lessons to be learned in caring for a garden, such as: too large a garden is a lesson in letting go, not trying to control so much; that there is a need for setting limits and priorities; that gardening is about learning balance, which things go together and which are poor combinations; and that in the later season of a life, as in a garden, there is a need for a little more tending.
A highly pleasurable read!

[Colleen]

Twelve+ years ago I read Roach's memoir, AND I SHALL HAVE SOME PEACE HERE, about leaving her corporate NYC job to live as a full-time writer and gardener in her upstate NY home. I recall liking the memoir because although she transitioned from city to country life in her 50s, I, in my early 20s, felt a kinship the idea of beginnings. I was early in my gardening journey and wanted to soak in all the tips for getting started. Roach, a long time gardener, was in a sense starting over, but with all the knowledge of gardening I lacked.

Her new(er) memoir (2013) is less about beginnings and more about endings. In THE BACKYARD PARABLES: LESSONS ON GARDENING, AND LIFE, Roach takes us again through a year in the garden, but this time she meanders, taking funny and strange detours, exploring why she gardens and what it all "means." The pace is slow. Often boring. But she's hilarious. She knows it's slow. She knows she meanders. I skimmed some sections but overall enjoyed this slow-paced reflection. I would not have liked it in my 20s, that's for sure. Guess I grew up. Go me.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

Absolutely wonderful. While I enjoyed And I Shall Find Some Peace There, I really loved this one. Lots of thoughts on life and death and why we love what we love and do what we do, interspersed with practical advice about gardening and cooking and taking care of the birds who visit your yard and all of the beautiful Latin botanical names. Very highly recommended.

*The idea, he's been reteaching over and over again the last two weeks in an emergency refresher course: Erase the evidence of disaster, and start imagining what you will put in the gaping places. That is of course a much better and saner view of all living landscapes, including our interior ones, than to hold on to the empty ache of disappointment and have to stare it in the face.*

*I find comfort here in my temple, in its reassuring monotony (think: "watching grass grow" or the way that a spring follows each winter, and a summer surfaces after that). I find exhilaration - a reminder I am alive, but in that "waiting for another shoe to drop" way - in its times of total madness, in the unexpected and often unwanted dramas that it lays at my doorstep. I have been privileged to attend many births here, of new seasons, new crops, new creatures, and also many deaths.*

*...Nature looks out for those she loves, and who love her. Look again, dig as deep as you can, moving aside the occasional rocks; reap all she has to offer.*

[Kristina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Margaret Roach is one talented lady. I first benefited from her creativity during my obsession with Martha Stewart Living (when I would devour the magazines and NEVER actually do anything creative!).

After years of navigating a whirlwind of New York City success, Ms. Roach moved upstate and began a quiet country life where she could garden extensively and enjoy “some peace.” Her property happens to be about thirty minutes from my own and thus, I know her weather, foliage, and wild critters well. She is a brilliant gardener with an honest, witty, and self-deprecating outlook to boot. THIS IS A GOOD BOOK. However, it was difficult to read because of several editing decisions. Initially it felt like a gardening diary with random, stream-of-consciousness thoughts intermingled with gardening advice. Divided into four sections (one for each season), there wasn’t a whole lot of cohesion in any part of the narrative. Lastly, Ms. Roach’s gardening advice was interspersed in these horrible grey text boxes in the middle of the narrative. If they were saved and grouped at the end of the book everything would have been MUCH easier to follow. So, enjoy the beauty and humor of Ms. Roach’s gardening life, but have patience (and time) in reading this journey.

[Lauriann · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have no shortage of how-to books and articles ripped from gardening magazine. While this book has a good healthy dose of practical how-to's, what brings it to five stars is the integration of the author's passion for gardening, and the witty, honest, engaging creativity she brings through her writing style. If you share her passion for gardening, you will gasp, inhale sharply, exclaim, each time you see yourself in the paragraphs. I was only on page xviii tucked between the Preface and Chapter One when I ran to the computer to email another impassioned gardener to recommend the book. I begrudgingly return this to the library today knowing that I will end up with my own copy on my bookshelf.

[Elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's been a long time since I loved a book so much I didn't want it to be over, but that's how I felt about this book. As a gardener and as a woman trying to make peace with middle-age, I appreciated this book on multiple levels.

[Patricia · Rating 2 out of 5]

I hate to give this two stars (only) because this woman is very knowledgeable and really is a good writer (technically speaking). It's just that for me, it was somewhat of a yawner.... descriptions just a bit TOO technical, too drawn out. Digressions were sometimes interesting, sometimes.... yawners. So, it was "ok" as far as I was concerned. I'm an avid gardener, but she's a bit too deep in her gardening observations for me. I do recommend if you're into technical, thorough, detailish gardening memoirs.

[Laura Duffield Biegger · Rating 4 out of 5]

Her joy and frustration with gardening and life in general are quite evident in her writing. This almost reads as if she is in the room visiting with you. Probably helps if you have been following her on her website. I think I liked Margaret's "And I Shall Have Some Peace There" better, but this is good, too.

[Cate (Kate) Caruso · Rating 3 out of 5]

I will recommend this book, but mostly to avid gardeners who like a lot of "woo woo" tossed in for good measure. For those who read Margaret's blog, as I do, you will find much repetition - which allowed me to skim through this book pretty quickly. Looking for the meaning of life in the garden? Margaret's your gal!

[Leanne Hunt · Rating 5 out of 5]

I only recently came across Margaret Roach but quickly became a fan when I began reading "The Backyard Parables" on audio. Roach reads her own words, which makes them come across in the most tender and endearing way. This author is a seasoned gardener who is practically married to her garden, having nurtured it for 30 years and become intimate with its changing seasons. When the garden suffers, she suffers, and when it is bursting with vitality, she is energised with enthusiasm and strength. Reading about her year of tending and turning her garden made me itch to get out of doors and make more of my own plot of earth.
The book is very much about plants and the creatures who live in the garden, but it is also more. As the title suggests, it communicates something of the author's philosophy, her wisdom about life as derived from working closely with growing things. Middle age has made her contemplate the inevitable end of all things. She finds herself confronted with the truth that she is but a short-lived sojourner in a landscape that has existed for eons and will go on for ages to come. Her mark on the land is therefore very small, yet it is powerful enough in the here and now to affect many living organisms. She expresses her wish to live companionably with the natural environment, and I believe her writing helps do that. The more readers she reaches, the more people become aware of what it means to live with consideration in nature. With so many present-day threats to ecology, this is surely extremely important.
I highly recommend this book to anyone who thinks they might enjoy gardening, as well as those who have done it for years. Margaret Roach is a talented author with a masterly turn of phrase and a gift for holding the reader's attention.

[Vincent Desjardins · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this up at my local library, thinking it might be something like Marc Hamer's "Seed to Dust," which I loved, and although they share some similarities (following the seasons of the year in a garden) I didn't find this one by Margaret Roach quite as engaging as I had hoped. While I found Hamer's look at being an aging gardener to be a comfort, I found Roach's look at the same subject to be a bit depressing. Even though Roach's book has a photo of a Buddha statue on the cover, her attitudes toward gardening seem anything but Zen-like. It's not until the last couple of pages when she describes why she gardens, that I felt some kinship with her attitudes. In these last pages she describes the comforts she finds in her "Temple of Fancy," though coming at the very end of the book, these comforts seem a bit at odds from much of what she has described before. Through out the book's four sections, each corresponding with a different season, I got the feeling that far from being comforted by gardening, she felt that gardening was one long, never-ending battle. As a gardener myself (though not on the same scale) I can understand many of her feelings of battling the weather and certain wildlife (deer in particular) but I guess I was hoping to read a more positive and humorous spin on some of these woes that all gardeners face. Though there is some humor, you have to hunt for it through her often digressive ramblings. If you're a gardener, there is much you'll identify with in these pages so it's definitely worth reading and if you haven't read Hamer's "Seed to Dust," you'll probably enjoy this a lot more.

[Hanlie Pieterse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Firstly, I don't generally appreciate an audiobook where an author reads their own book, but this one was the great.

As an avid gardener at the other side of the world (South Africa), I was fascinated by the extra work and hardship involving a garden that is not only exposed to wind, but has to deal with snow. It made me realise how privileged one is when having a garden where you can garden whole year round.

I started a new garden 5 years ago and resonated with her description of plants planted far too close, difficult decisions that now has to be made as to which ones get sacrificed, the endless work, endless pruning, endless weeding.

I loved the section about what to do about caterpillars, as I pondered this question this year too and also after some searching decided to live and let live. Once again her philosophical prose deeply spoke to me.

Apart from the vegetables, I am unfamiliar with almost all plants she describes. So why the five stars? Simple. She captured the essence of gardening in beautiful language. To garden is to face the Creator of beauty daily. To garden is to face the fact that everything, including ourselves, have a relatively fleeting existence.

I have seen this book in my local audio library and always gave it a miss. Not sure why. I am so glad that I finally listened to it. True gardeners share the same heart, no matter where they are. This book captured that heart.

[Kathleen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love Margaret Roach's books about gardening. She writes eloquently and with such passion, but I can see where some readers might feel she sounds a bit pretentious the way she uses the 'proper names' for all the trees, plants, flowers, etc.; names I can't begin to pronounce in my wildest dreams. But I don't care about that - I look at it as an educational experience. I've always wanted to live on a farm, or a property like Roach's, since I was a little girl. As I've aged I know that will never be, and now I wouldn't have the desire or patience to manage such a place. And that is exactly why I live vicariously through books such as this, and why I enjoy them so much.

Some of my favorite passages from the book:

"I know that means it's a dry snow, the kind that cannot settle but keeps repositioning itself with each gust, as if it finds each surface it tries too cold for comfort and moves along."

"Being a neighbor is one of those things you can't escape - even by moving. An understudy awaits at the next location, ready to fill the role."

"Like young surfers riding the waves, bobbing around at once competitive and playful, the hummingbirds come in a few at a time, as if each swell of air is washing them ashore here."

"Late-November days present themselves with peace and violence, often all at once - a peach-melba dawn sky is the backdrop for breakfast tartare."

[Audrey Driscoll · Rating 4 out of 5]

My first impression of this book is it was like one of those people who buttonholes you and rambles on endlessly about things they find utterly interesting, without considering whether you, the listener (or in this case, reader) really wants or needs to know all that stuff. But it's obvious Margaret Roach knows a lot about gardening, and much of what is contained here is useful information and valuable insights. By the time I finished reading the book (not in order, because I skipped ahead and doubled back), I was reconciled to the style and derived some enjoyment from the experience.
Roach's insights are drawn almost completely from working her own garden for more than two decades. Gardeners with smaller plots in places with quite different climates may not relate to her struggles with weather and other local challenges, but they will likely relate to something here -- the mental toughness gardeners need to get the job done, cope with losses and plan new projects. An index would have been useful.

[Debra · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had purchased Roach's And I Shall Have Some Peace There for my mother soon after it first came out. I loved to listen to Roach's radio show as well. I did enjoy her voice.

The Backyard Parables was another book I recently found in my Kindle lost stacks. Who knows when I had started this book. It was so long ago that I really should have started at the beginning, but I decided to persevere and finish it up.

It does lend itself to a casual reading and the sections can stand on their own.

If you like to garden, are a bit philosophical and like memoir style essays, pick this up.

[Molly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mostly garden memoir centered on this garden writer's home and garden in Copake Falls, NY, near the Mass. border. The book is ordered season by season from winter to autumn, with rambling personal narrative accompanied by sidebars that stretch on for pages on practical topics such as garden design, how to deal with deer, succession sowing, mulching, making bird-friendly gardens, underplanting, etc. An index would have been helpful. I'm not sure how much of the book I'll remember in a year, but one thing I particlarly appreciated is her emphasis on mortality, the cycle of life, plants coming and going in the garden, gardening while growing older.

[Robin Mandell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Round up to 4.5. Really love this book for the gardening information, and the philosophical musings. It would have gotten five stars, but some of the sections Felt a little irrelevant or distracting for me. Most of the book was really engaging though, and made me laugh, think, and wish that I had a large piece of property to try some of the gardening tips on. Definitely recommend this for people who love plants, and love thinking about life.

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I admit I ruined this memoir for myself by first reading A Way to Garden and seeing so many gorgeous photos of her plants and wildlife. This book is best enjoyed with internet access for those of us who haven’t memorized enough Latin names of plants to immediately conjure up a mental picture of everything she describes. Her writing is lovely though I am not a fan of multi-page informational asides and would have preferred more chapter breaks overall.

[Rachelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

A reflective read that is really meant for those who tend to their own garden and the garden of the soul. I would love to go visit Margaret Roach's garden. How brave of her to quit her job and go for it in the gardening and writing world! Helps to inherit the land:)

[Pam · Rating 2 out of 5]

As a scientist, I am not the literary type. I like information, data, facts presented in a concise manner all of which this book contains very little of but there are a few gems here and there. If you are a gardener and a literary type this might be of interest to you.

[Carmen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very entertaining account of a woman who gardens and writes about it. She ties it into her childhood, her philosophy of life, and is very funny. She also gives good sound advice. I enjoyed this read very much.

[Donna Clay · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thought initially that this would be novelish but truly a gardeners' book - but delightfully so! I'm not a gardener but I learned a lot. If gardening is your thing or "yarding" , good stuff! Quite enjoyable stuff!

[Kelly Ehrnman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good Read

[Lesa Liberamans · Rating 4 out of 5]

I very much enjoyed this unique book.

[Beth Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like how she wove actual gardening maintenance and plant selection information into her personal memoir. I’d give it 3 1/2 stars if I could.

[Maggie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this. For folks who have been gardening for a couple decades. Humorous and thoughtful.

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

The most delightful gardening book imaginable. An excellent mix of memoir, philosophy, random musing, and practical advice.

[Sam · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was hard for me to get through as much as I loved the subject matter. Her writing style was so conversational I couldn't find the narrative thread.

[Abigail Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed parts of this book and others I thought ran on for a bit. I definitely learned and enjoyed some of the stories. I think it was just a meh book for me, but not bad in anway!