Thursday, April 23, 2020 at 6:00 pm
Boneyard Bookworms meets once per month on the grounds of Laurel Hill or West Laurel Hill. There is no fee to join or attend, but registration for each session is required. To offer a unique perspective, each month’s discussion will be led by a different moderator whose areas of interest and expertise vary.
The April Boneyard Bookworm’s selection is part of the Longwood Gardens community read program: Weird Plants by Chris Thorogood. Our horticulturist, Gregg Tepper, will be joining the discussion to discuss how the weird plants in the book relate back to regional plants in Pennslyvania.
From Amazon.com:
In this little book of horrors, Chris Thorogood reveals the weird, the wonky, and the sinister specimens he has encountered during his travels in the wide world of plants. Far from passively absorbing the sun’s rays, these plants kill, steal and kidnap, making them dynamic participants in the ecosystems around them. From orchids that duplicitously look, feel and even smell like a female insect to bamboozle sex-crazed male bees to giant pitcher plants that have evolved toilets for tree shrews to carnivorous plants that drug, drown, and consume unsuspecting insect prey, Weird Plants takes us deep inside the worlds of plants whose imaginative and calculating survival methods are startlingly reminiscent of human schemes.
To guide us through these unfamiliar plantscapes, Thorogood has organized his book into seven categories fit for a horror film: Vampires, Killers, Fraudsters, Jailers, Accomplices, Survivors, and Hitchhikers. These categories take us through a variety of plant life and around the world, documenting the remote corners where many of these specimens are found. Through the combination of Thorogood’s oil paintings and botanical expertise, these fantastic plants come alive on the page.
The discussion will take place on Thursday, April 23, 2020 at 6:00 pm, at West Laurel Hill Cemetery’s Atrium at 225 Belmont Avenue, Bala Cynwyd, PA 19004. Free parking is to the right of the Funeral Home where the Atrium is located. Directions on how to get to the Funeral Home are available here.
For more information on Boneyard Bookworms visit here.
