Groves of Beauty and Plenty: An Atlas of Major Flowering Trees in India was first published in 2004. There was overwhelming response to it, and within a year-and-half the stocks were exhausted. Keeping in view the reviewer's feedback and audience response, we preferred to go in for the Second Edition in 2007 rather than opt for a reprint. However, the book remained out of print due to some unforeseen reasons.

The Indian subcontinent region is indeed very rich in biological diversity and is the second richest in the world after Brazil in the number of plant species. It is estimated that about 45,000 plant species exist in our country. Its position at the confluence of three biographic realms is the main reason for the remarkable diversity of life forms that include also the elements of African, European, Chinese and Indo-Malayan flora. The richness of the Indian flora is due to its vastness (embracing so many degrees of latitude), its range of climate and topography. Almost every major type of habitat is to be found here, i.e., from areas of the highest rainfall to the driest desert, from the coldest to the hottest climatic conditions, from the highest elevations down to the sea-level. Thus we have here, in India, a great diversity of ecosystems ranging from the hot deserts of Rajasthan to the cold deserts of Ladakh, the dry scrubs of Punjab to the tropical rainforests of Assam, the Western Ghats, and Andaman and Nicobar Islands, the coniferous and broad-leaved forests of the Himalayas, and the vegetational types found in water courses, fresh water and brackish-water bodies and marine coastal areas, including in the several groups of islands in Lakshadweep.

With the mounting photographic collection of our Tropical Trees database, we thus decided to enlarge the scope of our earlier book on Major Flowering Trees. In this new Cambridge edition, we have included more than 200 ornamental tree species alongside many closely related species and genera that are largely grown in the tropical belt of the Americas, Africa, West Asia, the Indian Subcontinent, extending from Southeast Asia to the Malayan Archipelago, going beyond across to the Pacific Ocean Islands, including parts of New Zealand and Australia.