Author: Dick Strawbridge
By BBC Books

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excellent seller service. thankyou, 2009-11-02
item arrived in good order and great condition, book is exactly as described and exactly what i wanted. thankyou very much

Author: Jean Liedloff
By Penguin

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A must read, 2010-04-29
I think that this is a book which would benefit any parent or parent-to be. In it the author shows us that in Western countries most of us torture our infants by denying them their most basic need- human contact. We can see by looking at the behaviour of babies born to societies where babies are still carried and in constant contact with their parents that this is what babies both want and need and this book helps us to see how we can bring this concept of parenting into a Western lifestyle so our babies can be happier, more contented, cry a lot less and develop faster. Some may be upset when reading the book if they have been following the advice of mainstream 'parenting experts' as this book will tell you you have been torturing your baby, but if you can get past that it is well worth a look to get a radically different view of life with your baby which is less about trying to force a baby to fit in with a modern lifestyle which makes no sense to them and more about adapting your lifestyle to include a baby in a more organic way.

Author: E.F. Schumacher
By Vintage

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'we are more than the sum of our possessions'.., 2010-01-03
What is wrong with our world? Can one short book contribute a meaningful answer to this question? By looking at the major historical themes in economics, i.e. land, scarcity, man and education, goods, production and energy, housing and development, and looking at the thinking behind our present view, the answer is yes. The book advocates a shift in lifestyle, one that accords material goods a secondary place after a oneness with our planet, putting people ahead of profits, and ensuring a future for both. Although first published in 1973, helping the Alternate Technology movement, the book should be regarded as required reading for many other reasons than the familiar Green agenda.
Much of what we achieve is labelled `economic' or `uneconomic', or simply said, what is profitable in monetary terms. The book highlights how, even in the short term, a full picture of man and his purpose on earth will change our assumptions of what is economic.
Chapter six focuses on education, the greatest of man's resources. The emphasis here is on understanding the driving philosophy of our world and compare with an alternative. At present, man appears lost when contemplating whether his existence has lasting significance. Why? Six leading ideas bear responsibility according to Schumacher, namely, 1. Evolution, 2. Natural selection, 3. Competition, likewise a `survival of the fittest', 4. Freud's interpretation of the subconscious, which reduces the higher manifestations of man's unconscious intelligence to the unfulfilled urgings of childhood, and the idea that these higher manifestations, religion, philosophy and art, for example, are inferior or superfluous compared with material goods and their consumption, 5. Relativism, the idea that knowledge is not absolute, but depends on the relations in which things stand to each other, and limited by the changing conditions of our perceptive faculties, 6. Positivism, the acceptance of only that which can be scientifically proven, or that which can be experienced, all else being regarded as speculative and hence inferior.
These are the ideas that dominate the way the world is interpreted for us. They are also destroying us.
The book argues for a holistic, long-term approach, working in harmony with the environment, a balance between the urban and rural dweller, and the western and third world, avoiding a `small, mean calculating attitude to life, one that refuses to see or value anything that fails to promise an immediate advantage'.

Author: Marek Kohn
By Faber and Faber

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Global Warming on a Local Scale, 2010-06-25
I've read several excellent books on climate change and ecological themes, most notably Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet and The World without Us. Marek Kohn's fine work ranks right up there with the best of them.

Despite the rather sensationalist cover, Kohn's text offers a balanced and thoroughly researched view. He looks at each landscape in the context of its past, examining how it has reached its present form and the stresses to which it is subject, before looking at how these factors are likely to change in the context of a warmer climate. Inevitably, I was drawn to the chapters dealing with the landscapes most familiar to me (as a Sussex lad, I particularly enjoyed the chapter on Cuckmere Haven), and other readers may find the same. But that's not to say that the other chapters weren't interesting, and the quality of the writing ensures that the book as a whole is an engaging and enjoyable read.

Some of Kohn's more speculative predictions might, in the long term, prove to be rather fanciful - somewhat akin to 'your home in the year 2000' pieces from old episodes of Tomorrow's World. However, that's a minor niggle, and predictions about future technologies are not a primary component of the book. The real focus in the natural world, with each landscape representing a different type of ecosystem. And this, for me, is the book's great strength. Its structure allows us to see how climate change will alter things on a local scale, bringing a sense of immediacy to a subject that can often seem too vast to comprehend in a meaningful way.

Author: Christopher Starr
By The Crowood Press Ltd

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Very informative, easy to read, balanced guide, 2010-03-09
As a landowner seriously considering woodland creation, I found this book easy to read, very informative and balanced. I'll be keeping it nearby as a useful reference to remind me about the key aspects of woodland creation and management. As with the best sources of knowledge, this book identifies the questions you need to ask yourself.

Author: Rachel Carson
By Penguin Classics

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Think twice before you spray, 2009-08-25
Excellent book that is well written. Takes you on a journey through how mankind is wrecking its own home. Why are we poisoning our own planet? Maybe that tractor spraying the wheat field isn't quite so innocent. What price cheap food? Is it corporate greed as usual? Rachel guides you through what we are doing to the earth with clarity and a list of suggestions for a better way to conduct ourselves. Worth a read.

Author: Paul Greenberg
By Allen Lane

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A book to be on all school syllabus, 2010-08-25
A wonderful book that makes a difficult subject very accessible, personal and shows ways forward within the present ecological debates, excellent.

Author: UNESCO
By Collins

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Excellent guide - provides inspiration for numerous journeys to come!, 2010-01-06
I have received it as a Christmas gift and it could not be better! It is a comprehensive compedium of all attractions listed on UNESCO list. Although they are just briefly described, book is an excellent source of inspiration and a starting point to further reading and planning.
The only comment is that some photographs could be a bit better, I have visited many of the places already and some photographs in the book do not do them justice. Nevertheless it is an amazing book and well worth buying.

Author: Mike Berners-Lee
By Green Profile

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Air-freighted out of season asparagus? Never again!, 2010-08-21
I love popular science books and programmes. As a trained scientist, who still does useful but not challenging science at work, (I'm a school lab technician), at best, these books are great at keeping the science bit of your brain ticking over while managing to also entertain, but it's great when you learn new things from them and use that to spark off question and debate.

That was definitely the case with this book. Berners-Lee which I shall abbreviate to B-L, (by the way, I was unable to find out whether he is related to Sir Tim B-L, the creator of the interweb - does anyone know?), is a environmental expert in calculating the total carbon footprint of everything. The important word here is `everything'. His method factors in not just manufacturing, but the footprint of the ingredients too and the corporations that make and sell things, plus the footprint of the item in use through to its eventual disposal - ie the total contribution of an item to global warming (its CO2e - equivalent). This complete way of looking at things throws up some amazing results, but more on that in a minute.

After the explanatory introductions, the book is presented in increasing CO2e from under 10g to 1 million tonnes and beyond, and is compared against a target lifestyle of up to ten tonnes per year for the average human. One thing B-L is clear on is that in aiming to improve our own carbon footprints we should all apply a sense of scale. What good is choosing a better hand-drying option when you spend your life on planes? But having said that, he says we should pick our battles, and work out where we can get the best return for our efforts. It was fascinating reading, although I found the lower CO2e first half more interesting than the big emitters at the end as these small things have a daily visible impact. B-L has a style that is fairly serious and earnest, but with occasional jocularity to keep things light. I'd recommend this book to anyone thinking about what they can do to green their lifestyle in small steps - which all add up eventually.

Let me share just a few of the many surprising facts I got from this book:

- The supermarket plastic bag is not so bad! It represents around one thousandnth of the CO2e of a typical shop, and ironically has less impact than a paper bag. Paper uses more paper and glue for equivalent strength, and the manufacturing process has more impact too.
- Bananas aren't actually that bad as they're usually shipped - on ships. It's the air-freighted asparagus and continental out of season hothouse tomatoes that are amongst the worst fruit and veg. Out of season and air-freighted fruit and veg have around 100x the CO2e of locally grown in-season produce.
- But what about cycling one mile? Assuming the cyclist burns around 50 calories per mile... If you're looking at the total CO2e you need to consider what provides the energy that you put into cycling - ie what you eat! If you're a fan of bananas, that'll produce around 65 grammes of CO2. If you had a bacon butty - it's around 200g of CO2. If you had a plate of air-freighted asparagus the CO2e is 2.8 kilogrammes.

It's all good fun, but I've learned a lot and will put lots of little bits into action in the future . As the author suggests, it will, (now I've read it), make an ideal toilet book!

Author: Masanobu Fukuoka
By NYRB Classics

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Brilliant!, 2010-07-16
A fantastic book - extremely interesting. It really leaves you wondering who the hell we are governed by to allow such things to be ignored when the results are clearly visible ...