I really enjoyed Eve's story. Plenty of chuckles, a few laugh-out-loud moments, and a lot I could relate to. Especially this time of year, when the kids have been inundated with gifts, the clutter seems out of control. Highly recommend for those of us with too much stuff and good intentions.

4.5 stars

(this is the review scheduled on my blog for March 1
When I chose this book on Netgalley, I hadn't heard the first thing about Eve Schaub at all and therefore had no preconception whatsoever. As it was an ARC, it didn't have the definitive cover, lest I would have stared and... passed.

I didn't know she was a blogger mostly known for her yearly project on living without sugar. If I had known it, I may have not requested the book because I'm a bit tired of these yearly projects landing a book deal. I'm totally game when stumbling upon a blog that makes real-time updates of such a project, but translated into a book it's often clunky and uneven.

So I came to the Year of No Clutter without prejudices to this book and I'm glad I did. I was looking for some versions of Americanized Konmari and it wasn't that at all, but it was fun and gentle and the perfect comfort read. It is not a how-to book full of magical methods to achieve minimalism. It is a memoir of a person who has hoarding tendencies, but who comes to terms with her own personality quirks and why she might have a thing for... things. The style is witty and fun and you soon feel that Eve is like your next-door neighbor. With a serious case of TMI.

Except she would never be my neighbor. This book is light and fun (and at times not so light, because hoarding comes from anxiety and deep issues and loneliness and insecurities, which is not the best topic for banter) - yet it's such an American problem. I don't say there aren't any hoarders in France, but I can't think of even a word for it. And for a typical Parisian, this book (by the sheer amount of stuff she owns and the number of square feet involved) feels a bit like Schadenfreude. Marie Kondo was a bit too woo-woo for my taste, but she as a Japanese has the same issues I face with far too few square feet to put my stuff.

Ultimately the book was a comfort read, even though perhaps for the wrong reasons. I have some clutter in my home, but I realized it wasn't due to the quantity of stuff but to the scarcity of space. Eve Schaub made me understand that I am no hoarder whatsoever, because she seemed to live on a different planet than mine. It was fun visiting her planet, but I was glad returning to mine.

<http://freshfiction.com/review.php?id=61863>

It was a fun book to read. I think the title threw me off...I was expecting more straightforward advice on how to declutter one's life as she learns them throughout her year. Instead, I found a person coming to terms with being an almost-hoarder and trying to do something about it (which is still pretty amazing!).

This book would be great for someone who doesn't feel as if s/he is living a cluttered life and/or has a hoarder mentality. A book like this should be gifted to that person. This book is less for people like me, who are actively trying to declutter their lives while already living an average (non-hoarder) lifestyle

Eve Schaub is on a mission: to rid herself of the family's "Hell Room", a huge room in her home that is stuffed with everything she can't face throwing out. It is the repository of all her clutter and allows her to pretend that she has a tidy house while keeping the door very much shut on the Hell Room. This book charts her attempt to clean it out while she tries to understand her family history of hoarding and why she struggles to throw things out.

I struggled through this mostly. I think the author's voice grated on me a bit and I found her a little self-absorbed - but isn't that the point of these memoirs? So I read on and I'm glad I finished it because yes, they cleaned out the Hell Room but there was no massive epiphany, no amazing transformation that means Eve can now throw everything out and live in a white box. The room is tidy and yes, she CAN throw things out easier now but life goes on. She still keeps some things and is not going to go overboard and cut out clutter FOREVER and I appreciated that.

In her honor, I may actually take that big bag of donations to the op shop today without "rescuing" anything before I do it!