Rating
I confess that when I first saw the title, I thought it sounded hokey, but as I flipped through it, I realized that this is another excellent Simon Brown book. I was concerned that this would be just a rehashing of previous information in a different format. But the information in this book is just as fresh and exciting as the lively layout and illustrations. For instance, he says purple is a Fire color, as well as red. As soon as I read that, it intuitively clicked as right. He also strongly recommends mechanical clocks as a Metal enhancement.
For years, I've wondered why Simon Brown's Compass style was a bit different from most of the other Compass books on the market. In a section on the "history of feng shui" he explains that he uses the Japanese Compass method. In the same section he refers to the type of feng shui that I practice (using an entrance-based bagua) as the Three Gate system. Call me stupid, but I'd never heard that name --- and it feels like a lovely, accurately descriptive name. On page 122, he shows some British geocentricity by saying that as the sun rises it will be in the Southeast. True for England, but not true for many other parts of the world. There are also a good many aggravating typos, which a good editor should have caught --- the worst of which is a mislableled chart on page 139. A chart with the characteristics of the elements is labeled as "characteristics of the animals." These are very minor faux pas, however, and do not affect the value of this remarkably fine book.
One of the themes of this book is projects that can be done in two days or less. That aspect left me cold, but "in a weekend" is a Sterling Publications trademark, and perhaps wasn't even Brown's idea. You certainly don't have to be project-oriented to learn a wealth of knowledge from this very accessible book.
Sterling Publishing Company, New York, 2002, 0-600-60378-4, 160 pages, color drawings photographs, paperback, $19.95