It's Easy Being Green: A Handbook for Earth-Friendly Living

This book is smaller than many, which makes it pallatable to those who might want to dip their toe into the eco-pool. It has straightforward language, resource pages, short chapters and simple (occasionally humorous) illustrations. The easy method of tracking actions that you can take gives you a sense of satisfaction as you check through what you are already doing, and what you can consider adding to your daily/weekly/monthly routines. Throughout certain areas of the chapters, there are three boxes next to some action items. The box farthest to the right signifies that this is an action that you would like to try, target or experiment with. Checking the middle box signifies that you are in the process of working on implementing it in your lifestyle. The left most and final box allows you to rate your success with that action on a scale of 1 to 5. For those of us who like lists and to see what we're doing, filling up this book with checks and numbers gives a sense that I can see that I'm making a difference. Great gift for a hard to shop for person who has everything...

What a great little book! It's chock full of information and even created out of recycled paper! As someone who wants to "go green," but doesn't want a lot of long explanations and hard to understand terms, this book was perfect for me! The author starts out by crushing the "green living myths," which is helpful, because I'm constantly explaining to others that it's not as hard as you think! There are hundreds of tips with 3 boxes by each one so you can check of what you want to work on, or number your success with it. The tips range from the ones I was already familiar with (such as buying organic, or letting fruit sit in a bowl of cold water rather than letting the water run) to those I wasn't familiar with (take used motor oil to your local service station for recycling. Motor oil never wears out; it can be recycled, re-refined, and used again and again). The author really did her homework because there are not only many ways to "get involved" in the back of the book, but lots of "green shopping" pages as well! I hope to find more books like this!

The cover of this book intrigued me. What made me take it home was that upon glancing through it, I found that it wasn't a breathy manifesto but rather a compilation of tips. This book is a really quick read and offers a lot of great advice on how you can help the planet... but one thing this book points out is that by helping the planet, you can save a lot of money. After reading through this book, I have to come to the conclusion that changing the way I live to help the earth wouldn't be as hard as I thought. The author wasn't critical but instead she was encouraging. I would definitely recommend this book to others who are seeking to make simple changes in their daily lives to help the environment.

Ms. Trask's book was my first book about how to live green. I've wanted to learn more but have always felt overwhelmed by the information in other books. This book is easy to read and to understand. Ms. Trask does not preach to you and she is not radical. The book is fun to read and has a great section of checklists: she lists pages of green ideas and you can check off what you are interested in working on. I really enjoy this book and plan to buy copies for my friends.

I'm very impressed with this book. Trask has provided a lot of information in a small package. There are lots of tips for how to be a better consumer, including how-tos for around the house as well as websites and company/product names for a more eco-friendly environment. For example, I always feel too busy to research what the best cleaning products are to use, but now it's all in one handy place, including ideas for making my own at home as well as names of environmentally friendly products I can purchase. I think this is a particularly good book for people who want to "do the right thing" but are intimidated or overwhelmed by both determining and doing what is best for our environment in our day-to-day lives. Trask's extensive resources and ideas give you lots to choose from - even if we all use only a few of her tips, the world will be a better place for it.