Sweeney, Emma

views updated

SWEENEY, Emma

PERSONAL: Female. Education: University of California-Berkeley, B.A., 1980.

ADDRESSES: Home—New York, NY. Office—Harold Ober Associates, Inc., 425 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10017.

CAREER: Harold Ober Associates, Inc., New York, NY, literary agent; author.

WRITINGS:

Annuals: A Growing Guide for Easy, Colorful Gardens, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1998.

Perennials: A Growing Guide for Easy, Colorful Gardens, Macmillan (New York, NY), 1998.

(With Willem Lemmers) Tulipa: A Photographer's Botanical, Artisan (New York, NY), 1999.

(With Jane O'Connor) The Complete Idiot's Guide to Gardening, Alpha Books, (New York, NY), 1999.

As Always, Jack: A Wartime Love Story, Little, Brown (Boston, MA), 2002.

SIDELIGHTS: In her book As Always, Jack: A Wartime Love story author Emma Sweeney recreates her parents' romance through the letters that her father, as a young U.S. Navy pilot, wrote to her mother while posted on active duty in the Pacific shortly after World War II. Sweeney never knew her father, as his plane disappeared off the coast of Bermuda in 1956 while her mother, Beebe was still pregnant with her.

Sweeney got to know her father through the letters she discovered after her mother's death in 1985. The forty-five letters span a period of seven months and encapsulate her parent's courtship. In a review for Booklist, GraceAnne A. DeCandido commented that the book gives readers a "glimpse [of] a life absolutely lived and then snuffed out." And a reviewer for Publishers Weekly observed that "the letters portray a decent, kindhearted young man with a quirky sense of humor who is obviously in love."

Sweeney has also written a number of books on gardening, including Annuals: A Growing Guide for Easy, Colorful Gardens, in which she provides the reader with practical advice and tips on a wide variety of topics such as using colors in the garden, organic gardening, and solutions to common gardening mistakes. Sweeney is also a regular contributor to the Gardner's Almanac.