Green Housekeeping

A must-have book for the twenty-first-century home..

Want a low-maintenance bathroom that takes 30 seconds a day to clean?

Need whiter whites that get whiter for free?

Learn to live in a clean, healthy, more economical — and Earth-friendly — way with Ellen Sandbeck's Green Housekeeping, the must-have book for the twenty-first-century home. You will learn to maintain every part of your home — from living room to septic tank, kitchen floor to bathroom sink — using safe, simple cleansers and quick, preventative measures that will save you time and money, save your health, and save the planet.

Publishers Weekly

According to the EPA, "the air in the average American home is between two and ten times more polluted than the air just outside the threshold." Sandbeck, a onetime housecleaner and roofer, explains why a homemaker must avoid toxins and pesticides if the home is to maintain a balanced, healthy ecosystem. The first chapter-touting the benefits of tidying up and getting organized-is tedious, but the book hits its groove in a chapter on "Organic Cleaning." Here, readers learn that all too often the very products we trust to keep our homes clean contain toxins and antimicrobials that kill beneficial organisms. Sandbeck touches on a wide array of housekeeping issues, sometimes almost straying dangerously off-topic. From preventing mold and mildew and controlling garden pests, to computer care and avoiding electrical fires, Sandbeck doles out knowledge with an easy-to-digest blend of authority and humor. (May) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.

Ellen Sandbeck is an organic landscaper, worm wrangler, writer, and graphic artist who lives with (and experiments on) her husband and an assortment of younger creatures — which includes two mostly grown children, a couple of dogs, a small flock of laying hens, and many thousands of composting worms — in Duluth, Minnesota. She is the author of Slug Bread & Beheaded Thistles and Eat More Dirt.