Tout Sweet, subtitled Hanging up my High Heels for a New Life in France, by Karen Wheeler. A fashion writer abandons her glamorous London life and buys a fixer-upper in rural France. The concept is appealing but the follow-through is a little too fluffy and predictable, even for me.

A Book of Silence, by Sara Maitland. I was intrigued by this book after reading a review in The New York Times. Among other subjects, Maitland writes about her 40-day, solo sojourn in a remote cottage on the Isle of Skye, off the northwest coast of Scotland.

Among her conclusions:
…with fewer things to look at I see better.
…I got interested in silence itself…We have reached a point in contemporary Western culture where we believe that too much silence is either 'mad' (depressive, escapist, weird) or 'bad' (selfish, antisocial).
…I discovered the silent joy of gardening…In our noise-obsessed culture it is very easy to forget just how many of the major physical forces on which we depend are 'silent'–gravity, electricity, light, tides…Organic growth is silent too. Cells divide, sap flows, bacteria multiply, energy runs thrilling through the earth, but without a murmur…Gardening puts me in contact with all this silent energy; gardeners become active partners in all that silent growth.

Window Boxes, by James Cramer & Dean Johnson. This book is here for inspiration. The pair has extremely innovative, seasonal ideas for window boxes and their contents. Even though I don't have a window box (alas), many of their designs are applicable to container gardens.

The Minnesota Homegrown Cookbook, subtitled Local Food, Local Restaurants, Local Recipes, presented by Renewing the Countryside. (What's the deal with subtitles?) During a recent stay in the Grand Rapids area, I sniffed out a fabulous coffee shop, Brewed Awakenings, where I spent many contented hours. The atmosphere is warm and hip, the coffee is strong and the display case is full of goodies including a scrumptious apple pie I can vouch for.

Near the register was a stack of cookbooks. As I leafed through one the first day I was intrigued because Brewed Awakenings was in the book. On ensuing visits I read even more and, finally, while buying my last cup of coffee and scone, I purchased the book.

It features 31 restaurants from around the state that specialize in excellent food with a tradition of sourcing good, local ingredients. Paired with each restaurant is one of their farmers–whether supplying fish, maple syrup, bison, chicken, dairy, vegetables or wine. Since the book is a cookbook, each restaurant also offers several recipes. I'm excited to try Mahnomin Porridge and Bison Sausage Bread from Hell's Kitchen and Herb Goat Cheese Quesadillas from Dancing Winds Farmstay Retreat.

The book begins: All food is not created equal. Anyone who bites into a just-picked tomato on a warm summer day knows that it hardly resembles that tomato-like thing you get in Minnesota grocery stores in January. And cheeses crafted by an artisan cheesemaker is worlds apart from those single-wrapped, processed slices that many of us grew up on. This is a book about homegrown food.