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World Hotels - Around the House and in the Garden: A Memoir of Heartbreak, Healing, and Home Improvement
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List Price: $15.95
Our Price: $15.95
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Scribner
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 809
EAN: 9780743226936
ISBN: 0743226933
Label: Scribner
Manufacturer: Scribner
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 208
Publication Date: 2003-03-25
Publisher: Scribner
Studio: Scribner
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Editorial Reviews:
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"My story," writes Dominique Browning, the editor in chief of House & Garden, "is about the way a house can express loss, and then bereavement, and then, finally, the rebuilding of a life." Around the House and in the Garden is a moving narrative, culled from Browning's much-loved monthly editorial column, about the solace and sense of self that can be found through tending to one's home. From building a high stone wall in the garden to learning that every kitchen deserves a good kitchen couch, Browning reminds us that making a home is more than just a materialistic endeavor -- it is a way for us to comfort and reinvent ourselves, to "have the final word about what goes where...what feels comfortable, what is life enhancing...and gives us strength to go out and embrace the world."
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating: 
Summary: Lovely Essays
Comment: I enjoyed this book so much I almost gave it five stars, but several of the essays were a bit disjointed. Still, those that are good are excellent. She does a masterful job at keeping personal detail out of her essays and writing nothing that will embarrass her sons. This is laudable, but it had the unsettling effect of making me wonder why in the world she divorced. This is a minor quibble, though. I think most thoughtful people would enjoy this book. I am not divorced, but it resonated with me as a mother and as someone who loves her home.
Customer Rating:
Summary: I'd Give it 10 Stars if I could
Comment: Sometimes a book comes along that changes our outlook--perhaps even pulls us from despair. Ms. Browning's book seemed to take my hand and yank me from the quagmire. She seemed to be saying, You are not the first woman to let a garden run to seed or to watch small trees sprout from your gutters! You are not the only woman who has made a mistake--whether it's choosing the wrong a sofa . . . or man. Giving ourselves permission to fix our lifes can often be as difficult as repairing a gas leak --the job is far too difficult and dangerous to contemplate. Setting ourselves free isn't painless--in fact, "setting" is the wrong word. It is more like ripping and tearing; although sometimes it can be more like a surgical separation--no matter, all methods are painful and require a period of rest and healing. That is the most important concept of the book--in her inimitable style, she gently reminds us that it is "okay" to let things go to seed, and that our houses and gardens are barometers of our emotional lives. These barometers will let us know when it is time to rebuild the nest.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great read!
Comment: Reminiscent of Jackson McCrae's "THE BARK OF THE DOGWOOD--A Tour of Southern Homes and Gardens" (though that book goes very deep into the lives of houses), Browning's book is full of heart-warming stories and insight into what really makes up a home. The details she notices are amazing and she brings them to life for us with a sense of poetry and style. What a brave and caring book she's given us.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Truly beautiful collection of essays
Comment: As a longtime fan of personal essays -- and one who teaches writing workshops on the topic -- I found this to be an exceptionally enjoyable and beautifully written collection. Best of all, as a homemaker who loves the domestic arts, I think Browning strikes just the right tone of love and yearning for home. Most of us are too busy these days to spend all the time we'd like creating a home and garden, or nurturing a young family. Browning hones in on these desires and serves up poignant pieces everyone can relate to -- even if we're not divorced or uprooted. I would love to see more of her work (yes, I subscribe to her magazine just to read her essays) in book form!
Customer Rating:
Summary: At last! Someone who gets it!
Comment: In her essays on life in a home, Dominique Browning, editor of House & Garden, offers her own intensely personal experience with the ways in which the home environment affects and is affected by divorce, self-esteem, and vice versa.Her descriptions of her rooms, her struggle to find a good living room couch (after successfully finding a kitchen sofa), her explanations of plants and flowers to her young sons, all create the feeling that you are on the phone with an old friend working to describe her evolving life. Her deep understanding of the ways in which our environments affect us (for better, for worse, just like marriage) leads the readers to feel like the changes we've been tempted to make might just be logical after all.
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