A professional gardener reflects on his daily routine and elusive employer in an immense and baroque garden. Beginning in January, and extending for one full year, each chapter in this arresting memoir depicts a single month for professional gardener Marc Hamer as he maintains the estate of his mysterious and wealthy employer, affectionately nicknamed Miss Cashmere. As Hamer rakes leaves in the fall and mows meadows in the spring, he muses on the unusual names, histories, and folklore of his beloved plants and the natural cycle of growth and death in this vast and intricate garden, which he has come to know so well, but where his employer rarely ventures. Hamer also reflects on the many changes in Miss Cashmere’s life since he has worked for her: the death of her husband and the departure of her children from the stately home where she now lives alone. Poignant, poetic, and life-affirming, Seed to Dust is a brilliant meditation on work, relationships, and the beauty and brutality of nature. | Seed To Dust by Marc Hamer, Hardcover | Indigo Chapters