Sleeping Naked Is Green by Vanessa Farquharson

I'd like to think I'm eco-minded, but the reality is I fall very very short in my earth friendly habits. But still, one eco-habit is better than none. And for Vanessa, she decides to do 365 new eco-friendly habits, one a day for a year.

Vanessa is a pretty normal twenty-seven year old. She likes fashion, pop fiction, food, wine, and dreams of having a boyfriend. But then she decides to green up her life and go ahead and make a new change every day in her life. These things run the gamut from turning off the fridge completely to writing haiku instead of regular poetry. Granted some of these things seem kind of superficial, but I think doing so many allows for a few of those. She also takes a few trips and meets other green bloggers; interviews celebrities, and also learns a little bit about composting, toilets, and other green initiatives.

The writing is done in short bursts. She outlines what she plans to do that month, and then tells snippets of some of the days. Some of the snippets are several paragraphs long, and others are only a few sentances. They are often humourous, telling of some of her exploits and failures of some of her Green acts. Others are more serious and detail how the change impacts her life in either a negative or positive way. She also maintained a blog for this endeavor, so everything is more than likely written in greater detail there as well. I do have to say that I would have preferred if some of the entries were longer. I would just get into a topic and it would end and go into a different day. It just felt very rushed.

She meets several unique people in her green journey. From Jamie Oliver to No Impact Man, she really expresses how nice the people are. It's a great way of writing about them. And even though there's not a lot of time devoted to any of them, I think she does a good job of expressing their character in the small bit she has for them. I also like that there was a lot of varied people. From her friends, to some of the other people she meets in Oregon on her bike tour, she never lacks for someone interesting to talk to.

I enjoyed reading this book for the most part. There are a lot of different things I'm eager to try myself, and Vanessa leads a pretty interesting life. Not a bad read and I may have to check out the blog as well.

Sleeping Naked Is Green
Copyright 2009
265 pages