Freedom of Simplicity
Richard Foster, Hodder and Stoughton.

A biblical case for simple living. Will be forced through global catastrophe in future anyway so can adopt changes for positive reasons now.

The Bumper book of Government Waste

How governments are seduced into squandering wealth

Lift the Label
David Westlake, Authentic

Third world pays the price for our cheap goods.

A short history of the Future
Colin Mason, Earthscan.

Another book on the theme of apocalypse soon. We cannot carry on living the western lifestyle for more than another decade due to oil depletion, global warming and so on. This book is from an Australian politician with a firm grasp of the realities of power. Epidemics such as bird flu viruses and water shortages in Australia, Africa and Nevada are predictable. This author predicts that the crises will converge around 2030 when combined with the tangible effects of climate change on agriculture and peak oil on globalisation. The message of hope is that we should start to change now.

The Penguin History of Economics.
Roger Blackhouse

This book observes that the fate of countries and peoples is not only controlled by kings and generals. The economist may toil in a library, unassuming and unknown yet the ideas in his books can affect the course of history over hundreds of years. This book covers economics from the Greeks and Hebrews to the present day. Highly relevant to the attitude towards the environment as we have moved from the dogma of Keynes to Friedman and maybe towards the insights of Schumacher.

The New Rulers of the World
John Pilger, Verso

An alternative view of western progress and the price paid by the rest of the world.
Also the total corruption of government and big business in unholy alliance.

The complete book of self-sufficiency.
John Seymour, Corgi books.

The godfather of many dreaming smallholders and homesteaders. This is a book I read in 1985 and which has laid dormant in my subconscious for several decades until I came across the Permaculture Magazine stall at the Tolpuddle Festival and had my interest rekindled.

It has single topic double pages on a massive range of traditional skills and handicrafts. The topics include how to pluck a chicken, make wine, build a wall or thatch a roof. It is an amazing treasury of inspiring countryside ways. The rich illustrations and diagrams give sufficient detail to genuinely teach the crafts.

The Transition movement takes such re-skilling at an individual level and applies it to a whole community. Self sufficiency has its attractions to our Anglo-American mindset yet in the past villages thrived together, sharing the harvest, one a blacksmith and the other a herbalist. In a low carbon future we will do better working together as we all rediscover the ancient ways.

I used it last Christmas when a farmer friend delivered some fresh rabbits and there it is; a step by step diagrammatic guide to skinning.

The Earth Care Manual. A permaculture handbook for Britain and other Temperate climes.
Patrick Whitefield. Permanent Publications.

A textbook of diverse aspects of sustainable living. This book covers general permaculture principles of living in harmony with the earth, slowly observing natural cycles then living within them. Thus the rich diversity of species is maintained as opposed to the monoculture of modern farms. Nothing is wasted as there is no “away” where rubbish can be thrown.

There are chapters on soil care, no dig gardening. Domestic and small scale mircrogeneration is covered, as is planning, waste and building.

I found the book useful in planning my own orchard and picked up tips on windbreak principles and the choice of nut trees to compliment the apples. Patrick was offering one day permaculture-at-your-place consultations in 2007. We enjoyed a day with this quietly spoken and immensely knowledgeable man. He had many ideas on how trees and plants could fit together symbiotically.

This is a great reference textbook.

Do Good lives have to cost the earth
Andrew Sims, Joe Smith ; Constable

Stand alone chapters from a wide variety of authors and well known national figures. So Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall on food, Anita Roddick on money, with David Cameron plus Hilary Benn on politics. A useful taster book to new concepts that one can then pick up if interested from the more substantial texts reviewed here.

Sustainable Energy, without the hot air.
David MacKay. http://www.withouthotair.com/

This well argued and logical book is available to download for free. It seeks to shine a light into the media debate between the environmentalists and the sceptics. The key is the use of understandable maths to give ball park figures to the energy from different sources.

It should inform politicians and planners as it takes assertions on wind power or renewable bulbs and tests them against the power needed to replace failing oil inputs. So if we are to have solar then how many panels will we need to maintain the status quo?

The conclusion for me is that we need to power-down and live lives that consume far fewer resources so that the rather feebler renewable sources can be sufficient for our genuine needs.
We have to change the way we live, commute and shop, and have massively more home insulation to make the sums for energy add up.

A great book for any sceptics.