Review: Helpful information for surviving disasters while you're on your own - 4 stars
Rating: 5 out of 5
Date: 01 1, 2014
First of all, the book is not intended to be a guide for long-term survivalists who plan for and train for living after a post-apocalyptic event such as war or catastrophic natural disaster. Instead, it's aimed at those who want to lay in a supply of essentials for surviving for shorter periods of time after a disaster. The author states that the Red Cross and FEMA recommend stocking enough supplies to last for three months. The book focuses on that kind of time frame, and includes recommendations for acquiring and storing food and water, tools, first aid, and personal hygiene items. There are a number of ways to build up a supply of survival foodstuffs, and the book discusses these. (And I've seen a lot of packaged non-perishable survival foods at Amazon.)The book includes a comprehensive list of essential tools and other nonfood supplies. It even recommends stockpiling certain seeds that could be planted for micro-farming. There are checklists for shopping for survival goods, and a spreadsheet for managing your supplies. The author recommends stocking enough potable drinking water in advance, but there are also tips for purifying non-potable water after disaster strikes.A little more than half of the book is devoted to recipes. Some recipes are intended to be prepared in advance and stored in a survival pantry, while others are to be prepared from supplies in the pantry.Overall, the book has a good bit of useful information for planning to survive a moderately severe disaster, particularly natural disasters like floods and hurricanes that might result in being isolated and on your own for relatively short periods of time. I know that there's interest in the subject of survival. When I searched for "survival" in Books on Amazon, I got more than 53,000 hits; in Sports & Outdoors, I got almost 5,000 hits.Note: If you're seriously interested in the subject of disaster planning, this book is a good basic reference, but I would recommend reading a few other books as well to cover the topic in depth.