However, to do that, you may need advice beyond standard Feng Shui books.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Annie Sloan’s Color Schemes: For Every Room can make your home or office look as if you’ve hired a professional decorator.

Let’s say that you’re working on your Fame and Reputation area.  That’s what visitors usually see first when they enter your home or office. Red is recommended, but… then what?  Many people get stuck at this point.

In Annie Sloan’s lavishly illustrated book, you can start at the “Reds Plus” page and choose a color theme.

For example, if you’d like a Pacific Islands look, start with Hibiscus Red–a slightly orange-ish red–and accent it with Gauguin Blue, a greyish medium blue.

Next, turn to the Pacific Islands section of the book and see lots of other colors that will work well with your basic red and blue “islands” theme. You may want to add Banana Leaf Green, Lagoon Blue, Guava Orange, or Mango Yellow.

If these colors don’t sound familiar, the book shows good, large swatches. You can take the book to the paint or home furnishings store to match the looks that you like.

If you’d prefer an African Visions theme for your Fame area, Ms. Sloan suggests starting with Ghana Red and Clearwater Green.

If you like antiques, choose the Neoclassical colors of Aubusson Pink and a lovely bamboo shade of brown called Sandstone.

All of those color combinations can work well in your Fame area.

But, this book shows you more than fame colors.

For your Feng Shui Money area — that’s the back left corner of your room, home or office — colors are really important.

Don’t overload that corner with purples!  Instead, you might choose an Elizabethan Pageant theme, and a muted Lavender Sachet shade, accented by a lovely pale Cambridge Blues.

If you favor vivid colors from the coast of France, Ms. Sloan offers an Impressionist palette.

Or, Mambo Carnival colors may jazz up an otherwise sedate or dark corner.

This book helps me to break out of the “crayon box colors” approach to Feng Shui. I’m using this book when decorating, but also for innovative color combinations in my art and photography.

If you’re working with color for any reason, I highly recommend Annie Sloan’s Color Schemes: For Every Room.  It’s one of the most useful books in my Feng Shui bookcase.

Annie Sloan’s Color Schemes: For Every Room
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33 used & new available from USD 0.26

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Clearing the Clutter for Good Feng Shui

In a perfect world, we’d all throw out, sell or give away items that we don’t need or don’t like.

Most of us aren’t that perfect. We need to be weaned off our clutter, a little at a time.  Drastic decluttering sessions are exhausting at best, and–in a manic moment–can cause us to throw out things that we actually need or value.

This book encourages you to get rid of the clutter. But, if you aren’t ready for that yet, the author points out where not to dump or store it.

For example, is your front door area and hall where family members tend to drop things as they enter… and then just leave them there?

Ms. Lambert points out, “If you have a pile of items that are stacked right by the entrance, it symbolizes life as being a real struggle, with opportunities barred.”   (You can apply this to your bedroom, too, if you tend to just drop things there, and are having romance problems.)

This book covers space clearing, clutter ‘hotspots’ and then takes you, room by room, through your home, including your home office and your attic.

In this book, you’ll get ideas for storage options, so that you don’t have to ‘get rid of it all’ right now. You’ll also learn important reasons not to overload your storage areas and containers.

Ms. Lambert uses Compass School directions, but you can easily use this book with the Black Hat Bagua. Most of her advice has very little to do with directions; it’s more about disorganized clutter and how it affects your life.

Purists may object that this book puts too much attention on storage, instead of parting with your clutter altogether.   I think it’s a useful book for those of us who can’t seem to live austere lives.  (Obviously, I’m one of those people coping with clutter, though I aspire to live simply.)

If other clutter-related Feng Shui books have been too extreme for you, this is an excellent book to help you clear your home and workplace, a little at a time.

For more about this book, and to read others’ reviews of it, visit Amazon.com, or Amazon.co.uk.

Clearing the Clutter for Good Feng Shui
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54 used & new available from USD 0.10