Special interest books and artwork are the focus here at B. B. Mackey Books.

Free! With any book purchase from this website during November and December, 2008 you get a free set of four attractive floral notecards in a cellophane packet.

Our aim here at B. B. Mackey Books is to help people garden well, especially when it comes to rock gardening and regional organic gardening. We craft readable, accurate, practical, and sometimes award-winning books. Take a look at our titles. Plus, you'll find free trough-making instructions and free garden how-to tips for many seasons. Read on for introductions to the authors, feature articles, links to other sites, and secure and reliable PayPal links for instant garden book purchases. Betty Mackey, Publisher

New for 2008-9 is Organic Gardening Down South, by Nellie Neal. Deep South gardening the organic way! 144 pages, illustrated and indexed. $15.95. The South has special factors that challenge gardeners but Nellie Neal, as usual, has the answers and a great description of the soil-food web. This book’s topics include soils, garden conditions, planning, pests, and ornamental and edible plants. It all leads to a bountiful, beautiful, non-toxic garden that feeds body and soul. Nellie Neal tells you how to use the power of organic gardening to make landscape tasks easier and more effective, just as she does as ‘GardenMama’ on her SuperTalk MS radio broadcasts. This is a wonderful gift for someone who is interested in a healthy and a self-sufficient lifestyle.

Just out this December, in time for the 2009 garden season, is very pretty notebook for your own garden notes. It is the blank but structured garden notebook, Garden Notes This Year by Betty Mackey. 112 pages long, 6 x 9 inches, it costs only $9.95. It is pictured above (love that pink rose!) and is the perfect gift for any gardener. Each week you enter the weather data, bird and wildlife notes, plant observations, tasks done, and other events. Click the book picture or name to go to the secure Paypal site and buy the book. Shipping to the USA or Canada is free and you get the four notecards, too.

Do you garden in Florida or know someone about to move there? Here is the second edition of that classic by Monica Brandies, Florida Gardening: the Newcomer's Survival Manual (2nd Ed.), with all the information a newcomer needs to prepare for the move and then have a great Florida garden. Laugh off the garden perils of a muggy buggy climate with Monica’s famous advice, always served forth with a warm smile. Monica is also the author of Herbs and Spices for Florida Gardens, her autobiographical book, Bless You for the Gifts, and, with me as co-author, A Cutting Garden for Florida.

Recently I published a classic biography of gardeners, Who Does Your Garden Grow, by British author Alex Pankhurst. It is the paperback edition and it tells the stories behind favorite cultivars in our gardens: how they were created and for whom they are named. Click here to read an excerpt.

In 2006, Rex Murfitt's book Creating and Planting Alpine Gardens, won a Quill and Trowel award for book writing from the Garden Writers Association. It is a 276-page paperback that entertainingly tells exactly how to build rock gardens and work with alpine plants. What a treasure trove for gardeners who downsize! It has a chapter on alpine houses and a directory filled with great plants to make your garden wonderful. It is the sequel to our award-winning rock garden classic, Creating and Planting Garden Troughs.

Before that came Questions and Answers for Deep South Gardeners by Nellie Neal, the popular host of SuperTalk MS Radio Network. , and some really great books for Florida gardeners by Monica Brandies.

Here is an offer for the free illustrated e-book by Betty Mackey called Gardening in Small Spaces. It takes up only 1.4 MB and you can email it around. For a free email PDF copy, write to bbmackey@prodigy.net and ask for the emailed copy.

And for trough lovers, here's papercrete. There are free instructions on the trough page and further info about the papercrete CD ($10 postpaid in USA). This is Betty's original technique, developed through trial and error and shown at the Philadelphia Flower Show and at Longwood Gardens.

$10 postpaid to USA addresses.