The Good Life for the noughties (Letting Go of the Glitz - Julia Stephenson)

Member Name: Dinah93

Product:	Letting Go of the Glitz - Julia Stephenson
Date:	21/09/09 (25 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good introduction to green living

Disadvantages: Often out of touch with reality

I read the blurb of this book, and thought it could be a very interesting modern take on 'The Good Life'. While I agree with the premise of self-sustainability, I did not feel the author was remotely in touch with reality. Her Good Life was very much a wannabe upper-class socalite trying to be different. I think this book is a good account for anyone with only a limited knowledge or experience of green issues, as it provides some interesting ideas and facts. However I felt that being green was the latest fad to the author, and in a few years time when it ceased to be amazing, she would have a new book out on a new way of life.

I have to admit this book had the twang of the 'green mummy' at the school gates. The one with the rich husband meaning she grows her own vegetables for status rather than nessessity, who recycles obsessively and has a friends of the earth bumper sticker in her back window, yet goes on 6 foreign holidays a year and drives a land rover despite living in town. Flying abroad for hayfever treatment was a good example of this, as I felt it clashed with the supposed green credentials of the author. I felt very allienated by the author, which made reading the book feel like I was being preached at rather than providing an interesting insight into a different way of life.

Summary: Green living for city dwellers