I just spent about an hour checking out 1000 Vegan Recipes and am very impressed. I am a former caterer/chef and am pretty good at eyeballing a recipe and determining if I will like it. It is obvious from the amazing assortment of recipes that Robin Robertson is a professional chef and has years (25) of experience.

This book is jammed full of wonderful recipes! I am not a vegan, but cook increasingly so and really needed a good vegan cookbook--1,000 Vegan Recipes is it!

This book has everything, including a recipe for seitan. I just bought seitan and was taken aback at its cost--$5.00 for 8 ounces! It was delicious, however and I planned to buy it again. Now, however, with the recipe Robertson provides, I can make my own which will be much cheaper and most likely, much better!

I like the explanations for all things vegan throughout the book.

There are tons of recipes I cannot wait to make. I have other vegetarian/vegan books, but sense this one will be my "go-to" cookbook!

From the author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT: BEAUTIFY DETOXIFY & ENERGIZE YOUR LIFE, YOUR HOME & YOUR PLANET.

I picked up Food Rules: An Eater's Manual, because I have been searching for just this type of book for many of my clients as a New Year's gift. I read the slim book quickly in a bookstore and it is the perfect present for my clients who are not eating healthy diets (but who have confessed they wish to.)

I am an interior designer/organizer and see how my clients eat all the time when I redesign and organize their kitchens. Pollan's In Defense of Food and The Omnivore's Dilemma are both excellent, but can be intimidating. Not Food Rules--it is short and easy to understand.

The book is divided into three parts and has 64 chapters or rules. The following will give you an good idea of what the book is about: Part I, What should I eat? Includes such chapters as "Don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food", "avoid food products that contain more than five ingredients", and "avoid foods that contain high-fructose corn syrup".

Part II, What kind of food should I eat? Includes "Eat mostly plants, especially leaves", "eat your colors", and "the whiter the bread, the sooner you will be dead."

Part III, How should I eat? Includes "pay more, eat less," "eat less," and "limit your snacks to unprocessed plant food."

For those of you who desire a healthier diet, Food Rules is a terrific guide that makes understanding what to put into your body simple to understand and implement.

Finally, if healthy eating is a new concept for you, you will find the clever chapter titles easy to memorize, thus making the concept of healthy eating a simple one to learn.

Highly recommend.

By the author of the award winning book, Harmonious Environment: Beautify, Detoxify & Energize Your Life, Your Home & Your Planet.

If you watch Ray's show or have other cookbooks by the author, and you looked through Rachael Ray's Big Orange Book without glancing at the cover, you would immediately know it was hers. To begin with, it's loaded with her unique language--EVOO (extra virgin olive oil,) "sammies" (sandwiches,) and more.

The largest section of the book is comprised of Ray's famous 30 minute meals. This section is broken down to soups & sammies, pasta, chicken, beef, ham & pork and fish.

Ever since my husband got back from a business trip in California and told me about a delicious meal of fish tacos, I've been experimenting. So, when I saw "My-oh-mahi tacos," I had to try them. They were delicious! The best part was that the recipe has you first wrap the filling with a corn tortilla, then a flour one. I think the corn tortillas taste and texture are great, but I hate how they always break, spilling taco contents everywhere. With the flour tortilla wrapped around it, everyone plays nice and stays inside.

There is a vegetarian chapter. Now, I assume if you are a vegetarian, you would not buy this book for the one chapter. However, be warned if you make Winter Greens Pasta for a vegetarian eater--the recipe calls for ANCHOVIES! Anchovies are FISH--therefore, this is not strictly a vegetarian dish.

Other chapters include kosher, family recipes, entree burgers, starters and snacks, holiday menus and dishes that take more than 30 minutes to prepare.

I also made Broken Florentine Lasagna Bake, because I love swiss char and am always looking for new ways to prepare it. This was very good and a very healthy meal.

Recommend.

By the author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT: BEAUTIFY, DETOXIFY & ENERGIZE YOUR LIFE, YOUR HOME & YOUR PLANET.

The first thing I noticed about Eckhart Tolle's Oneness with All Life: Inspirational Selections from a New Earth, is that it is a beautifully bound hard cover book (ribbon bookmark included,)with an old-time feel. The inside is beautifully laid out with flower illustrations. It actually conveys a feeling of peacefulness to hold the book.

"Your inner purpose is to awaken," says Tolle. This is the essence of the book, and what my own spiritual teacher tries to instill in her students. Each chapter works on this lofty spiritual plane.

Tolle recommends that you read A New Earth before Oneness with all Life, as this book is a distilled version of the first and contains fairly advanced spiritual lessons. He suggests reading a random section or single chapter at a time. The point is to read, reflect, and allow the messages to resonate within your soul.

"The informational content of this book is of relatively little importance," he writes. "You read it not so much to learn something new, but to go deeper, become more present, awaken out of the stream of incessant and compulsive thinking."

This sums up the book for me: "If you come across passages in this book that you feel are powerful, I want you to realize that what you are feeling is your own spiritual power. That is to say you are in your essence."

This book is like having your own spiritual teacher to turn to whenever you need some clarity.

A typical passage: "How to be at peace now. By making peace with the present moment."

Highly recommended.

By the author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT: BEAUTIFY, DETOXIFY & ENERGIZE YOUR LIFE, YOUR HOME & YOUR PLANET.

30 homes are featured in The Divine Home: Living with Spiritual Objects. The book is large and heavy and filled with Peter Vitale's luscious photography. While the photographs are breathtaking, the text tells the owner's stories and is quite interesting.

Most of the objects featured are of museum quality--but unlike a museum, the viewer gets to see the art within the context of a real home. As a designer, my favorite aspect of the book is seeing the way the art is displayed in the rooms. If you collect art, I would recommend this book for that feature alone.

Vitale features homes from super lavish in Texas to spare and contemporary in New York.

The Divine Home is a visual delight. Highly recommend.

By the author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT: BEAUTIFY, DETOXIFY & ENERGIZE YOUR LIFE, YOUR HOME & YOUR PLANET.

Martha Stewart's Cooking School: Lessons and Recipes for the Home Cook is an indispensable cooking guide for beginners through mid-level cooks. By mid-level, I am referring to anyone who cooks but is not adept at the various cooking techniques or one with a firm understanding of how and what tools to use in the kitchen.

As a former caterer and chef, I see that many people lack basic cooking skills. This book does a fantastic job of teaching the skill--Stewart provides clear instructions and the accompanying photographs makes the job of learning how to cook seem simple. (And cooking is fairly simple...you just need to practice--and get good guidance!)

The book is stunning in its layout and with impeccable photography throughout. The photographs alone would entice even the most reluctant beginner to jump in and learn to cook!

Cooking School begins with the basics--what cooking supplies to stock in your kitchen. Stewart believes in keeping things simple and she lists the basic equipment to do the job. Also included are knife sharpening tips and much more. Here again, the photos assist in the show and tell method of this book.

The remainder of the book is divided as follows:

* Stocks and dips
* Eggs
* Meat, fish and poultry
* Vegetables
* Pasta
* Dried beans and grains
* Desserts

Each section provides cooking techniques and recipes, many of which are classics.

This is a wonderful book to buy yourself or anyone who wants to learn to cook--or to cook better. I bought a copy for my niece as a housewarming present!

By the author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT: BEAUTIFY, DETOXIFY & ENERGIZE YOUR LIFE, YOUR HOME & YOUR PLANET.

Here's the Story: Surviving Marcia Brady and Finding My True Voice, by Maureen McCormick, is a memoir of a woman made famous by her role in the Brady Bunch, as the eldest daughter, Marcia. The Brady Bunch aired from 1969-1974, when Maureen was 13-18 years old. The Brady Bunch was a wildly successful show that ran on Friday nights--I know, I looked forward to it every week.

McCormick struggles most of her life because of her role as "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia." (This now infamous line was uttered by the middle daughter, Jan, because she felt her older sister got all the attention.) McCormick writes: "Imagine being shadowed by a younger,prettier, more popular you," referring to her role as Marcia.

I mentioned that I looked forward to watching The Brady Bunch every week--now, I was 8 years old when it started and it was the first show of its kind. But, it was always a bit dippy and moralistic. For example, whenever one of the kids did the slightest thing wrong, the whole family had to gather and mom and dad would lecture. GAG.

The reason I mention this is that McCormick had a thing about being "imperfect" her entire life compared to the "perfect" Marcia. Now, I was a kid, but it was pretty obvious this was a TV show--not something real.

On the other hand, I would have killed to look like Marcia---thin, with long, straight, blond hair. Maybe that was the perfection part.

McCormick provides details of what it was like on the Brady set,including crushes and such. I felt that there were too many details--do we really care about when she first got her period and how it happened? Or that she was jealous that Eve Plumb developed breasts before her?

The book is enjoyable, don't get me wrong--but it gets 4 stars, not 5 because it should have been edited more. Too many details throughout, the book drags at times.

McCormick reveals her family history (her mother's dad had syphilis and passed it to her mother) and her own life that included drug use, bulimia, and depression.

When McCormick turned 50, she agreed to be on the Celebrity Fit Club, a reality series in which the stars try to lose weight. McCormick is very successful at losing weight and feels good about herself. She writes: "After spending my life worrying about what people thought of me, what they might think of me, and trying to present a certain image, I gave up and was just me."

Ultimately, Maureen McCormick was brave to share this revealing memoir with the world. If nothing else, it shows that perfection is an illusion and that we would all be much better off if we could simply accept ourselves for who we really are.

Nice work.

By the author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT: BEAUTIFY, DETOXIFY & ENERGIZE YOUR LIFE, YOUR HOME & YOUR PLANET.

The Green Collar Economy, How One Solution Can Fix Our Two Biggest Problems, by Van Jones, could not be more timely. As our economy (and perhaps the world economy) enters a period called stagflation--meaning, a stagnant economy coupled with inflation--Jones offers a sound solution.

Van Jones gets right to the point in the first sentence of the introduction: "The pain at the gas pump is just the beginning...This weakness can and will send the entire country into a particular kind of a tailspin." Jones writes that oil can't keep up with the demand and that it is running out. This is a fact--we cannot keep on living as we have, sucking up finite resources as if there is no end.

"Clean coal", (an oxymoron, he explains, and part of a clever marketing campaign,) nuclear power plants, and off shore drilling are not the answer to our problems. We need to invest in sustainable resources--like the sun and moon--for the future of the planet and people.

Using corn for fuel was also a huge mistake. I love what he wrote: "Government-mandated and subsidized ethenal from corn will go down in history as the 'Iraq war' of environmental solution."

The solution to the problem lies within our people. Jones believes we need workers--and lots of them--trained to green our economy. Most of the jobs would be considered blue-collar, and little more than a high school education and some training would be necessary. The new green collar workers have jobs "preserving and enhancing environmental quality." Jobs run the gamut of installing solar panels to energy auditors.

Yesterday on the radio, I heard a plumber complain that he hasn't had so little work in over 20 years. That he considered a good day when he could work until 1pm. These people are who Jones writes about and are the workers who would most benefit from the new green economy.

Let us hope that The Green Collar Economy becomes the reality.

Highly recommended.

By the author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT: BEAUTIFY, DETOXIFY & ENERGIZE YOUR LIFE, YOUR HOME & YOUR PLANET.

From the moment I read the Publisher's Weekly starred review in June on The Story of Edgar Sawtelle: A Novel by David Wroblewski, I knew I had to read the book. It did take some time, but it was worth every moment. (I'll admit that I read some non-fiction in between--if for no other reason than to make the novel last longer!)

If you love animals--especially dogs--and believe in their power of communication and their ability to love, this book is a must read. I was entranced from the start, as The Sawtelle's raise a fictional breed of dog, known to be exceptional at understanding humans.

The hero, Edgar,a mute, bonds with his favorite dog, Almondine. How they communicated with such intensity and depth was deeply moving.

The novel is a thriller and does not disappoint.

While the novel deeply explores the communication between dog and human, it is also a book about humans' nature--bad and good.

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle will, no doubt,take an exalted place next to other great literature.

Congratulations, David Wroblewski!

Author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT

In Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution--and How It Can Renew America, Thomas Friedman presents an irresistible opportunity for Americans--one that can save the planet and increase our wealth.

The world is flat because of globalization--which is good, as ideas and practices can spread effectively. What is not so good is that our world population is exploding and countries like India and China are seeing an increase in wealth, which puts more strain on the world's resources and increases global warming.

Friedman begins the book with a discussion of how America has changed post 9/11. He uses the example of the US consulate built in 1882 in Istanbul. The consulate was built in the heart of the city: "it was an easy place for Turks to get a VISA, to peruse the library or to engage with an American diplomat."

Following the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the building was closed and a nearly impenetrable consulate was built. This all but stopped visitors from visiting. Although the new building does protect against attacks, it isolates Americans and impacts on how we are viewed and how we see ourselves.

Friedman writes that he wrote the book because: "An American living in a defensive crouch cannot fully tap the vast rivers of idealism, innovation, volunteerism, and philanthropy that still flow through our nation. And it cannot play the vital role it has long played for the rest of the world--as a beacon of hope and the country that we can always be counted on to lead the world in response to whatever is the most important challenge of the day."

That challenge is global warming. He proposes we begin a massive project called "code green."

Friedman identifies three broad trends in our society:
1. The post 9/11 building of walls around us to protect Americans from foreigners.
2. Since the 1980's, politicians acting "dumb as we wanna be," meaning we will get to fixing the roads, global warming and other issues when we get around to it. This includes politicians like Bush "protecting us" from gas taxes and other unpleasantries to keep our standard of living, or the fact that we are in war and don't have to make any sacrifices (save the soldier's lives.)
3. Nation building at home. This is the one good trend Friedman sees and he writes about the plethora of innovative, imaginative souls who devote their energy to finding green solutions.

Friedman considers what is now called the green movement to be more like a green party. He cites several "green" books that include the words "easy" or "lazy" in the titles. The authors write books where: "everyone is a winner, nobody gets hurt and nobody has to do anything hard." I have read several of these books and agree--much of the advice is fluff. However, I do see the recent deluge of books and articles on sustainability as changing the consciousness and buying habits of the country. Many people who begin by making "painless changes" get serious about the environment and one or two of them may be the next inventor of the solar-run car. I also believe that when millions cut down on the use of plastic and other nonrenewable resources, that it does make an environmental difference.

The increase in population and wealth and buying power all tax our already limited supply of petroleum, coal and gas--all substances that cause global warming and pollute our planet. Even if you didn't "believe" in global warming, it is a fact that petroleum--now needed in unprecedented amounts--is rapidly becoming an increasingly difficult product to procure. If you think spending $5.00 a gallon for gas for your car is a hardship, that price will be considered nothing in a few years. Folks, we are running out of time and oil.

Friedman gets that Americans can use the diminishing supply in nonrenewable resources as a means for an economic boom, for bridging the widening gap between Americans and the rest of the world and for drawing us together as a nation. Americans are an innovative and smart bunch of people and we need to get working on devising clean alternatives to fossil fuels. This will create more jobs, strong economic times and raised spirits.

Friedman presents a doable, win-win plan to raise wealth and to save the planet. A must-read.

By the author of the award winning book, HARMONIOUS ENVIRONMENT: BEAUTIFY, DETOXIFY & ENEGIZE YOUR LIFE, YOUR HOME & YOUR PLANET.