12 great authors offer their top tips on gardening, from Sylvia Plath's struggles with autumn bulbs, to JD Salinger's helpful hints on growing from seed. In Cormac McCarthy's hands a landowner's trip to the potting shed becomes a right of passage from which he will return transformed. Zola's striking miner finds life on the allotment more brutal and short than anything he imagined at the coal face. And Wodehouse's hero, anticipating a visit from his aunt, realises that the right choice of houseplant may well save him from the ignominy of marriage. Inspired, botanically-accurate, and utterly hilarious, ''Machiavelli's Lawn'' will appeal to green-fingered book lovers everywhere.