The weather is finally starting to warm up. That means soon that we’ll be able to start growing gardens! I haven’t ever planted a proper vegetable garden before, so I found some books that sounded helpful. I’ve included the book’s description under each title.

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“There is nothing more regionally specific than vegetable gardening—what to plant, when to plant it, and when to harvest are decisions based on climate, weather, and first frost. The Timber Press Guide to Vegetable Gardening in the Midwest, by regional expert Michael VanderBrug, focuses on the unique eccentricities of the Midwest gardening calendar. The month-by-month format makes it perfect for beginners and accessible to everyone—gardeners can start gardening the month they pick it up. Perfect for home gardeners in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, and Wisconsin.”

Indoor Edible Garden (Monarch/Libby)

“Grow herbs, vegetables, and flowers in your home that look amazing and taste even better with Indoor Edible Garden.

Featuring 28 innovative step-by-step projects, Indoor Edible Garden is a highly visual guide full of practical tips and stylish ideas for how to create edible indoor gardens using whatever space you have available-from balconies and windowsills to countertops, walls, and even ceilings. Inspiring from the start, this book shows off its lush garden projects through beautiful design and full-color photographs.

Reference more than 30 profiles of the top herbs, edible flowers, fruiting plants, and vegetables, then, follow DIY project templates to grow your gardens into beautiful home decor. The step-by-step instructions include how to create a hanging garden “globe” with chili and basil plants, how to make the growing area for herbs just right so they will flourish, and more. Plus, Indoor Edible Garden includes straightforward explanations of scientific methods such as artificial lighting and hydroponics and key techniques for planting, drainage, and harvesting.

Indoor Edible Garden helps create stunning and edible home decor so your living space will be fruitful-and beautiful-all year round.”

The Resilient Gardener

“Scientist/gardener Carol Deppe combines her passion for organic gardening with newly emerging scientific information from many fields ― resilience science, climatology, climate change, ecology, anthropology, paleontology, sustainable agriculture, nutrition, health, and medicine. In the last half of The Resilient Gardener, Deppe extends and illustrates these principles with detailed information about growing and using five key crops: potatoes, corn, beans, squash, and eggs.

In this book you’ll learn how to:

•Garden in an era of unpredictable weather and climate change

•Grow, store, and use more of your own staple crops

•Garden efficiently and comfortably (even if you have a bad back)

•Grow, store, and cook different varieties of potatoes and save your own potato seed

•Grow the right varieties of corn to make your own gourmet-quality fast-cooking polenta, cornbread, parched corn, corn cakes, pancakes and even savory corn gravy

•Make whole-grain, corn-based breads and cakes using the author’s original gluten-free recipes involving no other grains, artificial binders, or dairy products

•Grow and use popbeans and other grain legumes

•Grow, store, and use summer, winter, and drying squash

•Keep a home laying flock of ducks or chickens; integrate them with your gardening, and grow most of their feed.”

Crops in Tight Spots

“Short of outdoor space but want to grow fruit and vegetables? Congratulations. Really, lucky you. Not for you the back-breaking trudge of tending large spaces of land, the weeding, digging and pest vigilance. Gluts? They will mean nothing to you. Instead you can look forward to small but perfectly formed bursts of flavour. Handfuls of fresh leaves, berries and tomatoes, just when you want them, and at arm’s reach. As more of us live in cities with restricted outside spaces, growing food becomes all the more important, not just for the delicious results, but as a mindful way to connect us to the seasons and to nature. Full of tried-and-tested, fool-proof crop ideas exclusively tailored for containers, raised beds and small gardens, Crops in Tight Spots guarantees vegetable growing success for even the most newbie of gardeners and limited of spaces.”

Grow Cook Eat (Monarch/Libby)

“From sinking a seed into the soil through to sitting down to enjoy a meal made with vegetables and fruits harvested right outside your back door, this gorgeous kitchen gardening book is filled with practical, useful information for both novices and seasoned gardeners alike. Grow Cook Eatwill inspire people who already buy fresh, seasonal, local, organic food to grow the food they love to eat. For those who already have experience getting their hands dirty in the garden, this handbook will help them refine their gardening skills and cultivate gourmet quality food. The book also fills in the blanks that exist between growing food in the garden and using it in the kitchen with guides to 50 of the best-loved, tastiest vegetables, herbs, and small fruits. The guides give readers easy-to-follow planting and growing information, specific instructions for harvesting all the edible parts of the plant, advice on storing food in a way that maximizes flavor, basic preparation techniques, and recipes. The recipes at the end of each guide help readers explore the foods they grow and demonstrate how to use unusual foods, like radish greens, garlic scapes, and green coriander seeds.”