Poppy State: A Labyrinth of Plants and a Story of Beginnings

by Myriam Gurba

“The mother of intersectional Latinx identity.” —Cosmopolitan

"Scorchingly good."—Cheryl Strayed

“The most fearless writer in America.” —Luis Alberto Urrea, Pulitzer Prize finalist 

"A truly distinctive, authentic, and dynamic literary voice. . . Myriam Gurba is one of our great American intellectuals." —Los Angeles Times

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Myriam Gurba has lived in California her entire life, with its plants and soils, forests and ecology, immersing herself in the language of the landscape as refracted through the languages and memories of her ancestors. In Poppy State, California plants serve as structural anchors in a wildly inventive work of narrative nonfiction that is part botanical criticism, part personal storytelling, part study of place. Gurba traverses themes of language, power, ancestry, and California's ecology, in masterfully constructed sentences that seem to defy gravity, in the structure of a labyrinthine secret garden. The reader is invited to commune with California with Gurba as their guide, and is ushered through a compendium of anecdotes, reminiscences, utterances, lists, incantations, newspaper articles, and other ephemera.

As a child, Gurba helped her father plant a garden at their "house on the hill" overlooking the strawberry fields where he spends his days as an educator for the children of migrant workers. Through the stories of these plants she comes to a new understanding of what occurs in the cultivation of a soul. Gurba learns if she can care for her body as she does her plants, her soul can thrive—like the California poppy on her kitchen windowsill, emerging from a dented can of El Pato brand enchilada sauce filled with courtyard dirt. And through walks in the Angeles National Forest, she visits oaks, crows, elderberries, and sycamores, foraging for acorns, flowers, and berries to place on her altar at home, inviting the plants to write with her. Poppy State is a riveting tour de force that asks you to read it once and immediately read it again.

Genres: Nonfiction, Nature, Memoir, Audiobook, Essays

256 pages, Hardcover

Published October 21, 2025

Reviews

[Paige · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gurba’s collection of pieces about the ecology of California, and much more. Beautiful read.

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

A meandering, lush, lyrical nature walk through history both personal and cultural. I love the way Myriam writes. The book is filled with wordplay, puns, historical facts about settler botanists and indigenous land stewards. It is punctuated throughout with news clippings, personal photographs, and fragmentary passages about plant properties. I was engrossed the whole time. It made me want to pay more attention to plants, dirt, and rocks. It made me want to be more present in the physical world.

[Leigh Kaisen]

a lovely labyrinth of thought, memory, history, family, culture, legacy, and plants.

[Lyon.Brit.andthebookshelf · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book Report: Poppy State: A Labyrinth of Plants and a Story of Beginnings by Myriam Gurba

I’m so glad my friend Dorothy put this book on my radar 💛Poppy State is part memoir…part botanical meditation and part cultural history…a truly unique blend that could only come from Myriam Gurba. Through California’s plants…soils and landscapes…she explores identity…memory and belonging. Weaving in pop culture…family stories and sharp historical insight 🌾

Each chapter feels like walking with Gurba through the California she knows and loves…past oaks…poppies…crows and sycamores. While she reflects on what it means to tend both land and self. The structure is inventive and kaleidoscopic…lists…incantations…newspaper clippings and intimate vignettes come together to form a kind of living herbarium of her experiences.

I loved every minute of the audiobook 🎧 her voice carries humor… tenderness and bite but I’ll definitely be getting a physical copy to see the photographs and textures she describes so vividly.
If you’re drawn to books that braid ecology…ancestry and storytelling…think The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer…this is a perfect companion read. Gurba reminds us that caring for plants…language and the soul are all deeply connected acts. Truly special. 🌺✨

Thank you Hachette Audio | Timber Press for the ALC

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[Zee Monodee · Rating 2 out of 5]

Meandering and jumps from thing to thing and back again... Read a lot like fever dream energy (or plant high, too). Wasn't my cup of tea as it was very tricky to follow along and really get to the point of what the author was trying to say/get to at different points

[Edie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poppy State reads like an extended narrative poem in the best way possible. It is memoir and nature writing and political essay. It is deeply personal and broadly universal in scope. I feel obliged to make a Gloria Anzaldua reference. It is not linear. Parts contradict previous statements, just like in real life. It is an astounding combination of things which I don't know if I would have the courage to put together but Myriam Gurba has managed to make a beautiful offering out of bits and pieces. It is experimental enough to surprise the reader but not so much that it is inaccessible. It is spiritual, truthful, and brave. Thank you to the author, Hachette Audio, and NetGalley for the audioARC.

[Julia · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful collection of memories, history, and science intertwined with poetry and nature. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute. Anyone who loves Robin Wall Kimmerer will love this book!

[Pauly Wauly · Rating 5 out of 5]

Myriam Gurba’s Poppy State transforms the traditional trauma memoir by refusing to get in line with the usual linear narrative in favor of what she calls a labyrinth, a maze where readers have to get lost to find true meaning. This experimental approach creates a new form of testimony to bearing witness that combines botanical symbolism, dark humor, and spiritual practice to document both Gurba’s violence and recovery. Through her intricate weaving of California poppies with childhood trauma, personal memory, and Indigenous knowledge with contemporary healing brought from her family, Gurba demonstrates that bearing witness requires more than simple documentation of an event. It demands the creation of new forms capable of holding many (often contradicting) truths. Such as that beauty and danger coexist in the world, humor can resist trauma’s overarching presence, and that healing happens not through forgetting but through transforming memory into art. The reading of Poppy State transformed my understanding of bearing witnessing because Gurba’s memoir goes beyond simple historical events to include self-witnessing, from her perspective. She creates a memory collage that resembles the individual pieces of stained glass found in churches. These memories unite mythological elements with natural environments to show her deep struggle between pleasing and disturbing experiences. In her preamble she writes, “This is a habitat. Life happens here. Death does too” (Gurba 14). The author describes California as a place of both spiritual beauty and environmental damage, which as seen later in the book is a metaphor for the dual nature of people in Gurba’s, and possibly our lives too. People that we see as mentors that teach us morals that can never be erased; However, others that can be attributed to the “environmental damage” in our lives are represented by the name Gurba’s dad gives to people he despises, “assholes”. The concept of California or even Earth is one that functions as a historical archive which contains all the opposing forces between love and loss, and ancestral heritage, which Gurba employs in full extent in Poppy State. Bearing witness, as Sakinah Hofler explains in her TED talk “How Creative Writing Can Help You Through Life’s Hardest Moments,” involves the responsibility of keeping an open and accepting mind. When authors “bear witness” to their intimate stories of trauma or injustice in their own or others’ reality, it is our job as readers to acknowledge and validate their experience. We do not have to be their heroes, but we must be present and we must intently listen. Reading another’s story that sounds similar to ours can also allow us as readers to “bear witness” to both the author’s experiences and our own. Essentially, the vulnerable and open moments in an author’s life can stimulate the viewer’s minds to comprehend what exact events are displayed in their writing, which in turn creates a vulnerable atmosphere for those reading it. This concept appears throughout Poppy State, but Gurba complicates the process by showing how trauma resists conventional narrative structure. Her fragmented, maze-like approach better captures what Hofler describes as the way traumatic memories return. Not as coherent stories but as sensory fragments, unexpected triggers, and circular patterns that resist linear telling, like how many people legitimately remember these events in their lives, as blacked out bursts of imagery.
Gurba observes California through what she calls Poppy State, as a space where memory and opposing forces exist together in a living environment, which to me is a true bearing witness to a place scenario, a state or place which floods in joyous and horrid memories like the concept of yin and yang. The landscape that is shown here transforms into an open theatrical space in which her experiences of girlhood together with colonial heritage and natural environmental heritage. Reflecting on her childhood, she recalls, “Few flowers grew in the place where our girls-only club met, the baseball field in the southeast corner of our school playground” (Gurba 20). Describing the scene of an elementary school girls only club while on a field Gurba describes as seemingly barren/dry shares her inner thoughts of innocence and imagination being born through nothing. As in most people’s minds, if there’s only pure thoughts in people’s consciousness there’s no room for evil, which I believe is the message being stated. Not to mention the flowers mentioned in this field specifically could represent resistance to others’ temptations, that life will always breathe even if confined, which could be an overarching message across Gurba’s traumatic experiences. The overarching story of this chapter is that even in mundane spaces, the natural world morphs her concepts of imagination and fear, such as Gurba viewing her friend’s dads porn magazines. As to others reading the book, It portrays a message of a traumatic event yet it builds her modern character. “My dad says it’s against the law to pick those. They’re our state flower” (Gurba 22). This moment encapsulates the complex relationship between protection and prohibition, beauty and untouchability that runs throughout the memoir. The poppy is legally protected yet grows wild, officially celebrated yet forbidden to touch. Gurba employs poppies, and ghosts that reside along the Coast to demonstrate that California functions as a space where life and death coexist, where one poppy rises and a poppy falls. Through her memoir she uses the state as a witness to show both the violent and life-giving aspects of this seemingly alive yet also dying location. As previously mentioned the earth functions as an archival site, which in turn preserves all attempts at concealment of thought and idea while showing how personal and political trauma exists within specific locations. This can be observed even through her real life interviews, such as the writing workshop in PCC where she talked about getting raped in California, even writing about it in the unique format of the events unfolding from the point of view of various animals that could have spectated, while simultaneously discovering her true life while residing in the golden state.
In Katie Lee Ellison’s interview with the author, Gurba presents California as a place that exists as a living spirit which determines her personal identity and creative output. The interview shows how Poppy State maintained her previous work elements from Mean and Creep but she shifted her content from dark traumatic themes to bright restorative themes that can still mention those dark schematics while mixing some of her well known humor as a coping mechanism and to gleefully explain ideas to the reader. She describes her writing method of textured writing which she uses to position words for creating sensory experiences in reader perception, which to me sounds like a complex version of imagery. As previously stated Gurba describes the book structure as a maze which confuses readers but leads them to freedom while showing her emotional path from confusion to clarity, and in the end makes it feel like a reward to readers when they fully grasp the framework of the memoir. The discussion examines her Santería spiritual practice through which she uses a set of symbolic numbers: three and five, to create her stories, and coincidentally are used all throughout Poppy State. From the three tween tomboys found in the chapter “Two Tap Roots” to the five azquiles found in “Mermaid.” Gurba employs her quick-witted comedic approach to survive through unbearable circumstances while she reveals her raw harsh realities to her audience. She uses her comic skill to mentally defeat the concept of her manipulative “marijuana prince” by calling him “a stoner pastry” (Gurba 26). While in a separate instance within the same chapter of “Two Tap Roots” Gurba calls herself her dad’s “dirt daughter,” which is comedic because of the sarcastic self deprivation while mentioning a warm-hearted memory of learning from her dad to take care of these flowers. However, the real dual nature of this statement is that it all revisits her marijuana prince story, with Gurba utilizing that dirt daughter concept to defeat the apparent curse he put on her, reconnecting with family roots/tradition to defeat a powerful, modern concept like manipulative, substance abusing men. In addition to the absurdity of that stoner pastry image exemplifying how Gurba utilizes charm and danger to coexist together without making light of the resulting pain. The phrase transforms a potentially threatening figure into something ridiculous and consumable. Humor is her resistance against forced silence as she admits, “I quickly became addicted to the scent of the marijuana prince. He smelled of coconut. Clove. Vanilla. Cinnamon. Cardamom” (Gurba 26). Her rhythmic listing mimics intoxication, turning trauma into art and silly thoughts that resembles the silly addiction she had for him. Yet what Gurba is describing of the prince never empowers him, which this quote is a perfect example of because she uses scents that are associated with feminine or weak ideals, which to me is a genius way to dehumanize him further, a great revelation for Gurba to employ in her work. Then Gurba details “I was roused by the hum of an air conditioner. When I opened my eyes, I saw Juan Gabriel, Marta’s Persian cat” (Gurba 28). The unexpected normal events that appear without warning create comedic situations which help motivate readers to move on through the uncomfortable topics she goes on about, acting like a shield to protect any readers from the true horrors that occurred. This juxtaposition of the traumatic and the mundane reflects how life actually works. Terrible things happen, and then the cat needs feeding, the air conditioner hums, and life continues in all its ordinary strangeness. Through her work Gurba demonstrates that humor functions as a tool for taking back what has been lost in herself instead of humor serving as a way to avoid reality, humor in her own unique way is to find power in her vulnerability through being open with her comedic personality. Using it as a form of an explanatory literary device is not commonly used because it is often seen as tasteless to talk about trauma with its complete counterpart, and to many others reading it seems like humor just fits in her memoir, which is what makes Gurba’s brand of explanatory humor exquisite. The humor doesn’t diminish the seriousness of trauma but instead creates space within it for breath, for agency, for the full range of human response.
In Billy Lezra’s interview with writer and artist Myriam Gurba, she talks about how language, spirituality, and art help her deal with trauma and tell the truth. Gurba describes how she reclaimed control of her narrative through the process of labeling/name calling things or people that trouble her, such as calling her attacker as a creep. This act of naming represents a fundamental shift in power, the victim becomes the one who defines, categorizes, and dismisses. She shows how she uses horror elements with fog and knives to show how violence can appear in regular romantic situations. Gurba describes her relationship with Santa Muerte through her practice of worship because she believes this ritual enables her to confront her fears while understanding death as a natural part of existence. She explains throughout the interview that writing serves to create artistic work which enables others to experience and understand emotions. She believes that people will experience genuine healing through their time in nature where they can find beauty and laughter while building relationships with their community members. To me this interview shows her to be representative as a brave writer who uses her pain to create meaningful work which brings people together, through the process of bearing witness properly through being open and vulnerable with expressing not only agonizing episodes of trauma but alongside the subtle craft of coping strategies. The poppy functions as a complex symbol that represents the opposing nature of war throughout the entire memoir. The flower represents both the delicate nature of the flower and the vibrant colors of California, while Gurba uses it to symbolize the fight for survival. One concept that really grasped onto me was from a fellow peer, Alan, who explained that the poppy symbolizes light in darkness because it represents the hope that emerges from painful situations, which is one of the more thematic ideas I’ve heard. Historically, the poppy plant is the key ingredient for opium, which is a typically more soothing drug, so what Gurba wants to describe in her collage is her memories that feel relaxing to her, a poppy state, which Alan did a great job pointing out. In the ending parts of the book, recovery becomes tactile and ritualized, as Gurba writes, “Bite by bite, I became myself again. A poppy. Corn” (Gurba 249). Gurba turns healing into an embodied act. The flower and the food fuse into selfhood, showing how care and nourishment can transform harm into renewal or, as Gurba makes it seem, rebirth. The choice of corn alongside poppy is significant. Corn represents Indigenous Mexican heritage, the foundation of Mesoamerican civilization, which could be a sign that Gurba is trying to honor her ancestry through this median as corn is mentioned heavily throughout the book. Even going so far as naming an entire chapter Maiz, the Spanish word for corn. Gurba admits, “In my family, we continue to bury our dead with paper” (Gurba 72). She performs an act of radical openness that exemplifies bearing witness. This intimate revelation about her family’s personal death customs blends her Indigenous and Catholic traditions; yet also demonstrates how bearing witness requires exposing practices that could bring in misunderstanding. By documenting this ritual without explanation, Gurba refuses to translate her culture for outside approval. Gurba’s openness about these sacred family practices transforms private ceremony into public testimony, which helps create what Hofler described creative writing environments as: spaces where readers recognize their own silenced histories. This willingness to reveal without defending shows how bearing witness demands complete honesty, even when that honesty risks ridicule. Gurba uses these unorthodox experimental writing techniques to demonstrate her meanings. She presents memory fragments and lists and tonal changes to show the actual way traumatic memories return to the mind. Through her pattern-based depiction of pain she reveals her vulnerability because she shows her wounds and true openness when discussing her stories and culture. In the late section about community prejudice and her family’s advocacy, she notes, “They called him ‘that Mexican’” (Gurba 212). Gurba transforms a slur used for hate into a piece of evidence permanently laying out what occurred so it can’t be erased. Echoing our course idea of bearing witness because it isn’t about giving pity, it’s about attention and presence. Her voice legitimizes experiences the world often shuns, and invites readers to practice the same validating with one another without judgement.
Poppy State stands as a powerful testament to the transformative power of fully bearing witness. Through her labyrinth/stained glass structure, botanical/cultural symbolism, and unflinching use of humor in the face of trauma, Gurba creates not just a memoir but a new form of testimony meant to enlighten us on how to face trauma head on. She demonstrates that healing requires multiple methods to be truly “medicinal,” Western therapy provides a defined base, but Gurba introduces new readers to other more traditional healing practices, like Indigenous plant medicine, humor, and spiritual practice. By documenting her journey from brokenness toward wholeness through the metaphor of a mental “Poppy State.” Even at the end she explains her journey through this process of broken to whole. As mentioned in a previous paragraph, she kept describing her eating ingredients until she felt complete, then saying three words to describe a rebirth of herself, a new poppy, “a poppy. Corn” (Gurba 249). The book’s greatest achievement lies in its refusal of false resolution or simple closure.Instead, it presents recovery as an ongoing process of transformation, where getting lost in the maze becomes the necessary first step toward finding ourselves changed on the other side. This is why I believe the book feels unfinished, because that’s life until you die. Like Gurba’s memoir, you expect more in certain parts of life but everything has to come to an abrupt end, which Gurba utilized perfectly in her very last page of “Vital Garnish.” Gurba’s work validates experiences that the world often minimizes and invites readers to practice the same validating attention with one another, creating a collective space of witness that extends beyond the individual story to encompass wider truths about trauma, recovery, and the complex beauty of survival while bearing witness towards it.

[Joyce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful combination of photos, poetry, and prose telling the story of a California family with indigenous roots. Plants are always there to provide a backdrop.

[Erica Moore · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks to Netgalley and Hachette Audio | Timber Press for the advance listening copy.

2.5 stars, rounded up.

The subtitle of this book is “a labyrinth of plants and a story of beginning.” Labyrinth is an accurate descriptor as Gurba throws a lot of seemingly random facts/stories then segues back to stories of her own life. As a result, I spent a lot of the audiobook trying to keep up and a bit lost on how the stories and facts intersected. I believe reading a hard copy might have given me a slightly different experience as I'm led to believe through Gurba's narration that there are pictures and the printed text also contains stylistic and formatting choices that might bolster the narrative.

Overall, I have no background in ethnobotany, so perhaps I wasn't the target audience for this one. I am still highly interested in reading more linear versions of Gurba's life. So I'll read Mean and Creep and maybe try this one again afterward.

On the audiobook production, Gurba narrated her own book and sometimes I don't like when authors are the narrators. That's not the case here, as her inflection and tone helped me at least overcome some of my struggles to connect with the material. I actually really enjoyed her narration at least.

[Ioana · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first time reading Myriam Gurba and it's definitely not the last.

There are layers and layers of goodness in this book. Reading it has been an enriching experience: culturally, gender wise and just for the pleasure of it. I adore the author's way with words, mixing languages, meaning and personal significance, rhythm and magic.

There are book you just cannot relate to. This was not it for me. Being in the opposite side of the world from the fantastic Californian soil, having a different culture, but living the millennial woman life I couldn't feel closer to this narative. While Myriam Gurba speaks for herself, from her labyrinth of experiences and references, she illuminates a global search for a new relationship with the earth, with the body, a deeper understanding and relationship with our ancestor, an old / new spirituality of living with it all.

I cannot recommend this book enough and I am grateful to have received it in order to share my view on it. This is a piece of art that reveals a very specific window in our culture and we'll look back to this becoming a classic and a point of reference.

[Lorena · Rating 4 out of 5]

The labyrinth is a good symbol for this experimental narrative nonfiction. Myriam Gurba shares her story in a meandering, sometimes repetitive way that seems to involve frequent flashbacks and sidetracks. It took me a little while to start to understand what I was listening to, but by the end, it made sense and I was happy to have accompanied her on her interesting and informative journey.

Gurba can be a bit crude at times, but I appreciated her sense of humor and wordplay.

I particularly recommend the audiobook, which is narrated by the author. The audiobook production was excellent, and I loved hearing Gurba share her story in her own voice, especially given all the non-English words.

I recommend this book for those interested in experimental narrative nonfiction, memoir, ethnolinguistics, and cultural criticism.

Thanks to Hachette Audio for providing me with a free advanced review copy of the audiobook through NetGalley. I volunteered to provide an honest review.

[Nicole Perkins · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this book to be very meandering. Gurba ultimately brings her wandering stream-of-consciousness thoughts full circle, but this book reads like a maze of ideas. While Gurba's writing is very good, parts of this book felt like they didn't quite fit the narrative she was presenting, almost as they were written as afterthoughts. The style overall reminded me of Maria Popova's book "Figuring," exploring different people and times to support the main focus of the book (Maria Mitchell for Popova, Gurba herself for this book). I won't say that I did not like this book, but I feel that it is one that needs revisiting so a reader can fully appreciate all that Gurba is saying, and understand what she doesn't say in text, but alludes to.

[Jennifer Huberdeau · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Chumash women served as their nation's fire technicians, and the territory that they managed stretched from Malibu to Paso Robles. For millennia, the burns orchestrated by these matriarchs had generated rich plant and animal diversity." But then, the Spaniards took the land and banned the Chumash from using fire and began the undoing of the land stewardship that had existed. In "Poppy Seed: A Labyrinth of Plants and A Story of Beginnings," Myriam Gurba blends personal narrative with botanical criticism in a literary labyrinth of interconnected essays that challenge how we think about the interconnectedness of plants, nature and humanity.

[Patty Tomsky · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love this writer. She’s so honest and fearless and smart. The book’s chapters were so wildly different in tone but when put together they each made such an amazing quilt of experience. I recommend this book to all of my friends and family. I will read a scribbled napkin from Gurba because I loved her memoir, Mean, so much! This book requires sustained and restful attention and I almost wished I read it in one sitting for that reason. Incredible writing. Thank you to the publisher for the ARC.

[Isaac Salazar · Rating 4 out of 5]

A bit meandering, though I think that’s the point. Gurba attempts to stay in the tradition of her ancestry, who understood that “sometimes, to become a part of history, you have to write yourself into it” (165). I will say that some moments of Gurba emplacing her personal and/or familial life within these bigger picture (Californian) histories felt a bit forced, but she does solid work in telling a very human story alongside flora life.

[Lex]

Poppy State was not a book for me. I decided at about 40% of the way that I wasn't going to continue reading it. This book is very slow, and I had a really hard time staying engaged with it. The prose itself feels very disjointed and choppy, which made it difficult for me to latch onto the narrative string pulling everything together.

[Debbie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once I got into the first few pages I really enjoyed this writing style. I loved the different stories and memoirs and really appreciated the style. Some confronting history. Thank you to the author. Thank you to #netgalley and the publisher for an ARC.

[Virginia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Once I figured out how the writing (a labyrinth) worked I enjoyed finding out about the natural flora of California and about the indigenous people of the region. Four stars because it took me a while to get into it.

[Kathy Pierce · Rating 4 out of 5]

With metaphors between nature and humanity, the author describes botany/ecology of California (which was very visual and easy to understand) and her own history. Of special interest is the history of Santa Maria and the people behind the naming of many of our schools, streets, and policies.

[Helena · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting combination of styles describing Gurba's powerful healing journey using plants as the thread throughout the book. I enjoyed the mix of memoir, history, plant knowledge and poetry - it wove seamlessly into each other. Very unique book that was great to read.

[Michael McEwen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Such a shift from Mean and Creep. This feels like part scrapbook part Dream Journal. I was lost sometimes, but isn’t that the point of a labyrinth?

[Eli]

While only my opinion, I had a hard time digesting the audio book. I couldn’t finish it, as it sounds like an ADHD stream of consciousness. I’d imagine it is prose when you read it in print.

[Steph · Rating 5 out of 5]

How does one ethically inhabit land, one's body, this planet together? These are the questions Gurba explores with her vegetable examinations. Poppy State inspires me to explore my own garden.

[Polly Rose Hope (symes) · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very interesting work that combines history, ecology and autobiography, condemning settler colonialism and sexual violence against women. Quite a labyrinth to read tho

[Jan Stinchcomb · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautiful. A memoir, a necessary history lesson, a botany romance. An essential California book.