The Eco Chick Guide to Life: How to Be Fabulously Green

Journalist Vartan, founder of the environmental Web site eco-chick.com, makes “going green” irresistible in this breezy, energetic guide. In upbeat prose that will especially appeal to younger women, Vartan emphasizes that sustainable living needn’t involve making sacrifices; her host of recipes, trivia, instructions on cooking up homemade household cleaners and pet food (not to mention toothpaste!) and tips on ecological makeovers for the home, body and wardrobe make an environmentally friendly lifestyle seem desirable, accessible and full of creative potential. Packed with profiles of inspiring “eco chicks” and lists of organic products and companies, the book supplies readers with every possible resource necessary to launch and sustain their ecoconversion. Vartan’s pleasure in living consciously is infectious; readers will appreciate her lack of condescension or preachiness and feel inspired to test—if not wholeheartedly adopt—her simple prescriptions. The author informs and entertains as she presents natural solutions to roaches (catnip!), the unexpected health benefits of cast-iron cookware, how to offset the carbon-emissions caused by plane travel and how to (subtly) convert others to the cause. (Aug.)