Graham Stuart Thomas

Garden adviser to the British National Trust for 30 years, artist and writer, Thomas draws on his three areas of expertise in this splendid coffee-table book. ""One of the great difficulties artists experience is to make the flower appear to grow out of the paper,'' he writes in an introductory essay on flowers and flower painting. With his minimalist style, Thomas has mastered that task. The 170 illustrations, 58 in color, are precise, subtle and vivid; the color reproduction is exquisite. Like his artwork, Thomas's writing is well-crafted and graceful. The notes accompanying the illustrations nicely blend a bit of history about the flowers depicted, advice on how to grow and care for them and an occasional personal anecdote. More than 40 pages of the 184-page book are devoted to Thomas's great love, the rose. Appendixes chronicle Thomas's gardening works, published writings and artwork, and offer a listing of U.S. hardiness zones for the plants illustrated here. Garden Book Club alternate. (October)