Wicked Plants
March 22, 2010
I wasn’t supposed to buy Wicked Plants by Amy Stewart. I was supposed to not buy any books and get it from the library. But then the week after Christmas I stumbled into the Chapters in Kanata on the way to a friend’s place for dinner and discovered that hardcovers were on sale for 30% off. Oops. But I’m glad I bought it.
I had heard many good things about Wicked Plants, so much that I had no qualms about recommending it for a gift buying guide over the holidays. Now that I’ve read it I recommend it even more.
While it’s not a book that I’d probably take with me on vacation, it’s perfect for sitting on the nightstand and picking up on those nights that you just want to read a few pages. It’s a book that could make one a wee bit paranoid though, as I discovered how many plants I know and love have a sinister side. It also made me wonder if all the times I said that something was Queen Anne’s Lace it was actually one of it’s poisonous cousins. (Apparently a lot of things look like Queen Anne’s Lace.)
My mother would love this book and I’m seriously considering getting it for her for Mother’s Day. She loves books that tell you the science behind every day things. I’d also recommend it for Harry Potter science geeks because I kept having flashback to scenes from herbology and potions classes.
My only teeny-tiny complaint is the text boxes. They appear every couple of pages and my eye kept going toward them. I kept expecting them to have something important and new to say but they were just bits of text lifted from the plants descriptions. Sometimes that works but I found the plant descriptions, which were just a couple of pages usually, too short for that and it felt repetitive for me.
March 22nd, 2010 at 12:04 pm
Cool cover, good title, love plants. Enabler! Thanks so much, Sassy.
Andi´s last blog ..Mama Morphs
[Reply]
sassymonkey Reply:
March 23rd, 2010 at 11:26 am
Andi you know I live to enable your reading choices.
[Reply]
March 22nd, 2010 at 1:11 pm
I was also quite paranoid for a little while after reading this book.
Glad you finally read it!
Kristen M.´s last blog ..New Release: The Weed that Strings the Hangman’s Bag
[Reply]
sassymonkey Reply:
March 23rd, 2010 at 11:27 am
I think the plants are out to kill us. I’ve been picking at it for months, just reading bits of here and there. It’s a good book for that type of reading.
[Reply]
March 24th, 2010 at 1:43 pm
Have you read Amy Stewart’s From the Ground Up? I just adore that little gem of a book. I didn’t know about this one..must visit the library soon.
[Reply]