This book is an excellent companion to "Complete Book of Cacti and Succulents" by the same author (Terry Hewitt)."101 Essential Tips" has some information not included in the larger work. This reviewer recommends buying both books and consults both books on a regular basis.
This book is adequate on it's own, though. If one has a very limited budget, this would be the book to buy.
Reading this book will likely whet one's appetite for Hewitt's "Complete Book", but this book will get one started and might be all the book that one will ever really need. It contains every bit of basic information necessary to successfully grow these plants.
The format, of separately titled and illustrated "tips", also makes the book a very easy read. One can easily flip to some specific tip and never have to read the whole book end-to-end.
What it's not: This is not a book for identifying a just-purchased, unlabelled cactus. It's also not a coffee-table picture book (though it does have informative and useful photos) and it does not attempt to _thoroughly_ cover any aspect of cactus cultivation.
It is a small, inexpensive quick-reference with answers to common questions and solutions to common problems that arise when growing cactus. The photographs that it has are fully adequate for illustrating the techniques described.
The book shows implicitly, due to its small size and price, that growing cactus is neither difficult nor expensive.
This book is a very good value and makes a great starting book for those with a limited budget.
