Good enough to eat

For decades, West Coast gardeners have cut their teeth on instructive single-subject titles from Sunset. Here’s one for a new generation of edible gardeners. It’s thorough and tightly organized in short, easy-to-digest morsels with oodles of brightly colored photos and illustrations.

In typical Sunset style, edible gardening is presented as a can-do activity. The writing is crystalline with no wasted words. Building projects and plantings plans are inspiring, uncomplicated and in scale with the average home garden.

Experienced kitchen gardeners may find the book too elementary. And only the most conventional crops are included in “Edibles A-Z,” nothing more exotic than arugula and mesclun.

But gardeners starting their first beans and berries and those new to edible gardening in a mild winter climate will find the illustrations and basic information (site selection, soils, planting, watering, composting) valuable.

When growing edibles looks this easy and attractive, motivation follows naturally.

-- Lili Singer