Green Living Guide by Hugh Bowring

Green Living Guide by Hugh Bowring
Buy Green Living Guide by Hugh Bowring at Amazon.co.uk or Amazon.com
Category: Lifestyle
Reviewer: Ruth Ng
Summary: Made in a magazine format so it's easy to dip in and out of, this book is packed with helpful tips, money-saving ideas and information about living green in every area of your life.
Buy? Yes	Borrow? Yes
Pages: 196	Date: October 2009
Publisher: Dennis Publishing
ISBN: 978-1907232060
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The Green Living Guide is a Magbook - so the format is like that of a magazine - and although it initially seems a little expensive for something that looks just like a magazine you quickly find, on opening, that it contains an enormous amount of interesting and useful information. Even already determined eco-warriors should find something of interest in this wide-ranging guide.

The articles are well written - very accessible and in small enough chunks to take in over a cup of coffee or for a quiet five minutes in the bathroom! They don't just tell you what you can do, but they explain why you should do it, which I think is important when it comes to environmental action. Many of the articles relate to money saving differences you can make relatively easily in your life, explaining how you can better insulate your home, shop more wisely for anything from eco-friendly electrical goods to make-up, baby accessories and clothing. The section on household chemicals was one that I found very interesting since my daughter has had skin allergy issues since she was born, so I try to use the bare amount of chemicals around her as possible.

I missed that there wasn't an index - it would be a handy way to find a reference you remember but you're not sure where you read it. The book is, at least, organised into colour coded sections dealing with, for example, Home and Garden or Transport and Motoring. There are just a couple of adverts inside, and there's vastly more information than you'd typically find in a magazine. It differs from a magazine in that you would want to keep this for future reference rather than throw away, or rather, recycle it!

The section on Work and Office was very interesting and reminded me of a dear friend I used to work with who was inspirational in her commitment to being green, getting rid of disposal cups at work and making everyone use real mugs, taking waste paper from the bin which had only been printed on on one side and using that for making notes...I think laziness comes into play a lot of the time, and that if everyone just spent an extra five minutes to sort out their recycling properly, or make a proper shopping list to avoid panicky, wasteful buying in the supermarket, or even just turning the tap off whilst brushing your teeth then all those little changes could end up making a big difference.

I learnt a lot through reading the guide. We already try to be quite environmentally aware at home but there are so many more things we could be doing. I even, helpfully, have an excuse for not doing any ironing now. Well, to be honest, they say not to bother ironing underpants, sheets and napkins, which I've never done in my life (and I applaud anyone who does, but now you don't have to!) Still, there were lots of other things that made me think 'I can do that,' and hopefully I will!

I'd like to thank the publishers for sending a copy to The Bookbag.

Further reading suggestion:

For more green living books try our Top Ten Green Books for Eco-Warriors, or if you enjoy this format and fancy a different topic then another useful magbook is Gettin Started in DSLR Photogrphy by Daniel Lezano.

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