The life-changing magic of a little bit of Mess by Kerri Sackville
Rating: 
Nothing is perfect, and as such, the reviews in this blog are chaotic. My main aim is to share my thoughts, joy and opinions on a book, not make a publication perfect review. This blog endorses authenticity, showing up and joy over perfection.
Disclaimer: Receiving a review copy from the publisher does not affect my opinion of the book. If you think I review it highly it is due to me knowing my taste well and therefore not requesting books I won’t enjoy. And I am not obligated to review the book if I do not like it, so you may not see bad reviews due to me preferring not to hype down a particular book. I only do reviews of books I disagreed with if I think it is worth bringing a topic or warning to light.
Disclaimer: Receiving a review copy from the publisher does not affect my opinion of the book. If you think I review it highly it is due to me knowing my taste well and therefore not requesting books I won’t enjoy. And I am not obligated to review the book if I do not like it, so you may not see bad reviews due to me preferring not to hype down a particular book. I only do reviews of books I disagreed with if I think it is worth bringing a topic or warning to light.
As someone who is chaotic and embraces it, this book felt right for me. So when Harper360 offered it for a review, I accepted. It was intriguing. And I wasn’t sure what to expect, would it actually save my life telling me chaos is the one way? Or was it actually going to try to reduce my level of chaos?
Turns out that this was all about having a little bit of fun and also, about learning that sometimes the mess is just you know, inevitable and there are other important things in life to prioritise over cleaning.
If you come to this book expecting perfectly amazing cleaning guidance and detailed how-to guides to achieve a magnificent balance of mess and cleanliness, this is so much not the book for you. But if you are a bit confused about how influencers seem to be living their best life with minimalism and spotless houses when you barely can keep up with life, then this may be a bit of comic relief and validation that mess is not that bad.
The main reason I didn’t give it full stars is that it does a little repetitive the kind of humour and it sometimes feels overdone, or becomes a bit less funny and more “oh you again”, but there is some good advise in that maybe not keeping the perfect pristine house isn’t the end of the world and being ok with having a house you can live in,m and noticing that you are balancing, work and maybe a family, and trying to keep healthy and everything else one is meant to do, it is hard to also keep a house perfectly clean.
For me, who has days of bad body movement where I knock tea cups (normally over my desk or my hobby area, trust me it is not fun), or days where standing requires a lot of effort, so tasks are hard and I decide to rest instead of pressuring myself, it was validating, but it also reminded me that the little hacks I’ve done don’t make me less of a good person or homekeeper. There is no moral value to keeping a pristine home. So buying a robot hoover (Chaos Bot even has a personality) to cope with the dirt and mud downstairs, or a cordless hoover, and a handheld little one because that means you can tackle each of the tasks in small amounts isn’t a bad thing.
So overall, validating, interesting, not advise on how to keep the perfect house, but also, the humour can be a little bit much (do consider I don’t read a lot of humour or comedy, but this book felt like something I should read and it was good to read).
