Sheetrock & Shellac: A Thinking Person's Guide to the Art and Science of Home Improvement

The author draws on his own home construction experiences to offer insight into such projects as replacing leaky roofs, rewiring a room, and building a home office, in a reference complemented by practical tips and observations about the psychological benefits of do-it-yourself renovations.

Owen, a New Yorker staff writer, takes the middle road here, offering neither a brass-tacks guide to renovation nor an acute introspective account of the endless remodeling of his home. Instead, he ping-pongs between describing the incomplete minutiae of many projects in his rambling 200-year-old Connecticut house, walking staccato-step through the building of a cabin some 10 miles away and diving into the history of such things as kitchen surfaces, window glazes and shellac. He presumes readers have followed his various projects as he's written about them over the years. Those who haven't can indeed still follow, though they might feel they are eavesdropping on someone else's conversation. Owen writes that home improvement is "an ongoing relationship between a dwelling and its dwellers, and when it's done right it doesn't end." When he finishes something he sees only what he did wrong, so prefers to "leave a few ends dangling," which provides only limited insight into the nature of human domesticity or creativity. Owen will not connect with the many home renovators who, no matter how pleasurable the process nor satisfying the outcome, want to finish something they started. (June)
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Prolific author and New Yorker staff writer Owen approaches the age-old "how do I do it myself" question uniquely. Instead of step-by-step directions for, say, cutting down a tree or erecting wallboard, he first traces his beginnings as a DIYer--in his case, creating a second bedroom out of a 750-square-foot Manhattan apartment--which leads to his Connecticut home ownership, and the soon-to-be-fulfilled yen to build a ground-up cabin. So, this home-improvement odyssey (or, as one of his friends notes, "If I'd known I could afford to spend this much on a house, I'd have bought a nice one to begin with") tackles each room; the kitchen, for instance, includes detailed word sketches of the preparation process as well as riffs on the more than $15,000 Aga cookers and countertop alternatives. (Formica, by the way, is the most popular material.) Other meanderings are just as riveting: his musings on the beauties of wire screening lead him to the efficacies of "adhesive pest management" from the Tanglefoot Company and, eventually, to borate solutions that wipe out wood-boring beetles naturally. Charming and edifying, regardless of the reader's DIY proficiencies. Barbara Jacobs
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