Did you ever wonder where Charlotte the spider lived? I can visualize Mrs. White working away in one of her gardens, E.B. reclining on a lawn chair. He dozes off, and when he wakes finds a lovely garden spider has spun it's web exactly over his head. "Charlotte" he exclaims!

Mrs. White's articles were written several decades ago, and they reflect an era many cannot recall. (The median age of the U.S. population is about 30 so most residents were born after she wrote many of these articles.)

This was an era of elegance, white gloves, hats, and ladies luncheons--though Mrs White also worked fulltime for the New Yorker Magazine. Mr. White muses in the forward to this book that when they lived at their Maine home, every day before noon Mrs. White would arrive from the cutting garden with mud-ringed Ferragamos and arrange flowers for the dining room table. Well, I would never abuse my Ferragamos, but it's lovely to bring fresh flowers from the garden into the house.

Mrs. White had many uses for flowers. "Goldenrod...can be made into a crown of gold for a Harvest Queen or a necklace for a child." Her words evoke the more carfree days of a childhood when there were many fields about, and most children rich or poor could fashion a necklace of golden flowers. Riches indeed.

In an age when many gardeners are overly concerned with design, Katherine White reminds us Nature creates much more visually beautiful spaces than mere mortals can, and perhaps we better work to save the remaining space. I've enjoyed the pieces Mrs. White wrote, and I am glad Mr. White took the time to compile them into one book.

This book purports to be an "affectionate memoir." In reality, Russell paints an extremely unhappy picture of Katharine White's declining years. Russell entered the White household as Mrs. White's secretary, and while her account of Mrs. White's loosening grasp on reality is likely true (Mrs. White suffered from a number of serious health problems and was on countless medications) Russell's need to expose this story and to constantly portray herself as a victim leaves a very nasty aftertaste. The book ultimately says much more about Russell (almost all of it negative) than about either of the Whites.It should be mentioned that Russell adored E. B. White. Her perceptiveness concerning the White marriage, or any self-awareness, however, unfortunately seem to be nil.