I am writing this to let you and other officers of our committee know that I am proposing to do a small book about our allotment site and the people on it, set in the context of the allotment movement.

I have written quite a few gardening books before (around 10), many of them on garden design, and also written features for a number of newspapers and mags, but I wanted this to be a bit different from the usual books, so am proposing to self-publish it (wearing my other hat, which is that of a small independent publisher).

It would focus more on who has an allotment and what they get out of it, as well as how each of them goes about it and the kinds of things they like to grow or grow most successfully. I would want to interview and photograph a cross-section of plot-holders, from newbies to the very experienced, and various nationalities too.

It would be photographed by Steven Wooster (who won the Garden Writers Guild Photographer of the Year) and it would be printed professionally. The proposed publication would be early autumn 2013.

If anyone would like to be interviewed, or wants to suggest someone that they think should be, I am more than happy to hear from them, but would need to make the final decision myself as to whether to include them or not.

I propose to pay 10 per cent of any profits made on the book to the Golders Green Allotment Association fund. Anybody from the Association whose plot is featured will get a free copy and anyone else will be able to buy them at a good discount! Any interview will be checked with the interviewee before publication too.

I have attached a cover of my last book about growing produce in containers, Kitchen Harvest, published by Frances Lincoln and also photographed by Steve Wooster, for which John Wingate (our late and much lamented chairman) did a lot of the growing!! In fact, it converted him to growing his prize exhibit potatoes in containers, as they stayed blemish free!!

Cheers
Susan