Rating: 
Summary: Honors a beautiful art.
Review: The art of homemaking, and the science, are the substance of this wonderful book. Making a home that is welcoming, nurturing, comforting and well-functioning is truly an art, and the author describes in detail how homemakers can learn the necessary skills. In one area only, she is somewhat lacking: making your own cleaning products. For that, read Karen Logan's outstanding guidebook _Clean House, Clean Planet._ There is such joy in making a home that works, with skill and knowledge. Ms. Mendelson lets readers in on how that can be accomplished. However expert, anyone can learn from this book.
Rating:
Summary: Comprehensive Housekeeping for all stages
Review: This book has a little something for everyone, from the seasoned housekeeping pro to the newly married person who's never kept house in their life. It has tons of helpful tips on everything from when and how to turn your mattress to how to sew a hem to what lighting is best in which situation to how long to keep that beef in your fridge before it's unsafe. This is definately a book to hang onto for reference!
Rating:
Summary: Dust Bunnies Be Gone
Review: I have a job, large home, relaxed husband, a couple of children, dogs, cats, etc. Maintaining a clean and organized home is something I aspire to but never seem to achieve. Heavens, when my Italian mother comes to visit, I go into a cleaning frenzy because she adhers to the cleanliness is next to godliness philosophy and I dread disappointing her with my casual household.So with all this on my plate, why did I find Cheryl Medndelson's book so fascinating? Probably because it was so well written about a subject I thought I knew something about. Boy, did she open up my thinking to new and productive ways of managing a home. I am trying quite a few of her suggestions, although I still continue some of my slovenly ways. As a reference book, this is outstanding. If you have any questions or concerns about the most appropriate way to handle household problems, this book will have the answer and then some. Give it a try, you might find yourself pleasantly surprised.
Rating:
Summary: This Book is Wonderful
Review: This is a great practical guide for anyone interested in keeping a clean and safe home. The author states that she hopes that her book will serve as a guide and a reference source for matters around the home. I found the information for safe food handling and storage helpful and informative. Also helpful were the guidelines on caring for fabric in clothing and in home furnishings. For anyone who thinks the author's tone is snobby or too cold, remember that this is a book written primarily as a reference resource. I found her tone appropriate for this purpose.
Rating: 
Summary: Comprehensive and Useful
Review: I borrowed this book from the library before buying it because I'd read here and elsewhere about the author's potentially off-putting tone. While she does fail to set a friendly, relaxing tone, the level of useful detail is amazing. And, one wonders whether a relaxed person could have written this book: hundreds of pages of densely-packed information on everything from fire safety to cloth construction to the microbiology of a kitchen. And the tone isn't unfriendly, just businesslike. The author seems driven and that quality can make those of us who aren't a little uncomfortable. But she has written an intelligent, comprehensive, useful resource. It's a smart book for smart people who want to know more about housekeeping. I think it's a great gift for people starting out, covered everything I never learned.
Rating:
Summary: Helpful and inspiring
Review: I thought this was the most informative and inspiring book on housekeeping that I have ever read. I don't understand the comments of other readers who say the author comes off as snobby or that you will feel guilty after reading the book. I found neither to be true. The author never says that things have to be done a certain way. She only tells you the reasons behind her suggestions and the rest is up to you. I got a lot of good ideas from this book. Other ideas I read and decided they were not for me. For example, changing bed linens. She says changing them twice a week is a good idea but that doing it once a week is fine too. It's up to you. I thinks the section on setting up schedules for daily, weekly and monthly tasks is great. A lot of good ideas and very inspiring.
Rating: 
Summary: The Art and Science of Stalking Dustmites
Review: The last reviewer inspired me to write a similar one. I too got a lot out of this book. I now air my sheets for an hour every morning and make my bed daily; something 16 years of nagging never accomplished. Why do I do it now? The author points out how *GOOD* a fresh bed feels...and it does! I now know how and why to purchase really good knives. I finally know exactly what a bedbug is (didn't you always want to know that?) The humor is subtle and often (but not often enough) self-deprecating. BUT...I think the author devotes too much time to things people outside of Manhattan will never see. How many of us have or even want a wine-storage refrigeration unit? Yet the author uses an inordinate amount of time to discuss the merits of one. Also, it makes me wonder how much time she has actually spent with her son in between being a lawyer, writing this 900 page book, daily vacuming, changing her bedsheets 3 times a week, lugging her mattress out into the yard twice a year, cooking three meals a day, and scrubbing baseboards and lightswitches. My husband's mother is a fabulous housekeeper but he grew up emotionally neglected because he and his 4 brothers and sisters weren't as important as attacking the mold spores under the bathroom sink. I think a lot of what she champions is unrealistic for anyone with a life. But it's a GREAT reference work.
Rating:
Summary: Not quite inspirational
Review: The book is filled with information and encouragement, but the tone is too proper for me. I'm glad I purchased it, and I have changed my ways a bit because of the author's suggestions. An example - white sheets are easier to clean (it's true). Cheryl describes the ideal, the proper, the perfect, with a little bit of snobbery thrown in. Wouldn't we all like a nice tea and snack in the afternoon? Yes but where's the reality in that? I will use the book to define the stars I'm shooting for, but don't consider myself hopeless for accepting a little dust in my life.
Rating:
Summary: Useful book, but expect to feel inadequate
Review: I very much respect what the author is trying to do here - bring back the art of good housekeeping. And I really learned a lot from some of the chapters. But at other times I think she goes overboard in what she expects is possible for the average working person to accomplish each week. And I thought I was germ-phobic. But next to her I feel like a slob. (Bleach, bleach everywhere! should be her battle cry) This book made me even more paranoid. But with that in mind, it's still a good reference book.
Rating:
Summary: An essential reference
Review: "Home Comforts" is a massive guide to the fundamentals of keeping house. An engaging writer (on a subject I NEVER would have thought I would care about), Ms. Mendelson provides a thorough reference to caring for one's home and possessions, from the proper way to clean wood floors to how to lower one's dry-cleaning expenses to safety matters. For someone like me who never really learned how to keep house, this is an essential reference. Yes, the author is often obssessive--and she freely admits to that charge. (Has Martha Stewart ever done so?) In fact, she details which chores she believes are essential and which tasks are obssessive. But her advice seems to be generally sound and thoroughly researched, especially when it comes to explaining the scientific & medical reasons of why certain tasks should be done in certain ways. (The chapter on dust mites is, frankly, slightly terrifying.) This isn't a book about decorating or crafts for the home or time management (though there is some advice about organizing). There are dozens of other sources for those subjects--take this for what it is. It's fantastic, and it's changed the way my husband and I keep our house. I wish more books--non-fiction and non-fiction--could be so well-written.
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