It's ironic that some plants thrive in soil that has been displaced. Due to the devastation around us, these flowers bloom profusely, yet I find their tenacity and beauty uplifting.

How did these organs of plant sex manage to get themselves cross-wired with human ideas of value and status and Eros? And what might our ancient attraction for flowers have to teach us about the deeper mysteries of beauty - what one poet has called "this grace wholly gratuitous"? Is that what it is? Or does beauty have a purpose? (64)

What I try to do - and I think this is the former librarian in me - is to get primary source material.

When I was young, I read everything I could lay my hands on, but the Scots in my storybooks spent their time fighting glorious battles, rowing across lochs, or escaping over moors of purple heather. Even those Scots were hard to find. For at school, we recited poetry according to the set texts the teachers taught us.

In order to deliver the emotional truth in the story, you have to include some of the literal truth.

I must tell you this, Maggie. Your letters are my lifeline. Your threat to stop them terrified me. Never stop writing to me, I implore you.