Orchard House: How a Neglected Garden Taught One Family to Grow

Copyright © 2015 by Tara Austen Weaver

Map copyright © 2015 by Simon M. Sullivan

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Random House LLC, a Penguin Random House Company, New York.

B
ALLANTINE
and the H
OUSE
colophon are registered trademarks of Random House LLC.

L
IBRARY OF
C
ONGRESS
C
ATALOGING-IN-
P
UBLICATION
D
ATA

Weaver, Tara Austen.

Orchard House : How a Neglected Garden Taught One Family to Grow / Tara Austen Weaver.

pages cm

ISBN 978-0-345-54807-8 (hardcover : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-0-345-54808-5 (eBook)

1. Gardening. 2. Personal narratives. I. Title.

SB455.W42 2015

635—dc23

2014039547

eBook ISBN 9780345548085

www.ballantinebooks.com

eBook design adapted from printed book design by Susan Turner

Cover design: Marietta Anastassatos

Cover photograph: Tara Austen Weaver

v4.1

a

Oh! the things which happened in that garden! If you have never had a garden you cannot understand, and if you have had a garden you will know that it would take a whole book to describe all that came to pass there.

—F
RANCES
H
ODGSON
B
URNETT
,
The Secret Garden

• • •

To bury grief, plant a seed.

—German proverb

If the garden has taught me anything, it's that you cannot hurry time. A seed will sprout and flower and fruit all on its own schedule (greenhouses notwithstanding). A story, however, must sometimes be condensed—as this one has been. The timeline has been shortened, and, in some cases, names have been changed.

A memoir is, at heart, a work of memory—and memory is subjective. No two people experiencing the same event will remember it the same. This story is true to my memory, but anyone else who was there would tell it differently. This is what I experienced, this is how it was for me.