Paradise Lot : Two Plant Geeks, One-Tenth of an Acre, and the Making of an Edible Garden Oasis in the City

Inspiring read about how two guys transformed 1/10th (and the picture showing just how small this is is quite a revelation) of an acre of very poor urban soil into a productive permaculture garden capable of keeping four people in fresh food for much of the year and encouraging wildlife back into the city. Unlike a lot of permaculture books I found this refreshingly free of mysticism and down-to-Earth, and I liked how they acknowledged real world social justice issues - the importance of keeping neighbours on board, the fact they could only afford the land because their parents helped out, their embarrassment at not campaigning to change laws about livestock, the importance of meeting people where they were and encouraging them to put their experience of growing annuals to good use rather than striving for absolute ideological purity. I find this approach, bringing others with you, much easier to respect than simply retreating from the rest of humanity to an isolated farm in the countryside where you may be able to meet all of your own needs more easily, but perhaps aren't paying attention to anyone else's.

I must admit I did find their attitude to the possible introduction of invasive species somewhat cavalier - while I do accept the point that globally this is likely to be less damaging than importing food at a huge carbon cost, if everyone took this sort of "chaotic good" attitude, making their own decisions on the costs and benefits of environmental actions, it would lead to absolute chaos.

Overall though I found this an inspiring read - if people without much money, with full time jobs and with an extremely degraded piece of land can do this perhaps I could too. And the authors' philosophy that humans can go beyond minimising their impact on the environment to actually improving it is definitely a much more optimistic philosophy than is usually found in the environmental movement.