Close to Paradise: The Gardens of Naples, Capri and the Amalfi Coast

This book showcases twenty-one of the most celebrated gardens in Italy's most glamorous seaside getaway. They include La Reggia, Caserta, the 'Italian Versailles' laid out for the Bourbon King Charles III in the mid-eighteenth century, the gardens of the Villa San Michele on Capri and Lord Grimthorpe's Villa Cimbrone in Ravello, with its breathtaking panoramas.

The text also traces the horticultural history of Campania, from Roman emperors to Edwardian millionaires, encompassing a parade of glamorous characters that includes Lord Byron, Wagner, Chanel, Jacqueline Kennedy, D.H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf and Graham Greene.