The Complete Idiot's Guide to Feng Shui

View other editions of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Feng Shui.
View books by Elizabeth Moran, Val Biktashev, Joseph Yu.

I was an idiot for buying this - Rated
The title misleads you into thinking the book is for those who know NOTHING about the subject. Well, I reckon you need a basic knowledge of it to even read the thing let alone apply any of the practices. It lost me almost from the beginning. It was boring and talked down to me. Maybe I'm stupid. I just wanted to learn from scratch the concepts of Feng Shui. I thought it might be fun. This book has put me off. If all the books on Feng Shui are as laboured and heavy going, then I'm no longer interested.

Third Edition - Second reading - Rated
Hugo Hørlych Karlsen is a danish author and translator. He is Master of Arts in Scandinavian Language and Literature and qualified in Classical Chinese Medicine. He has translated several of the Chinese classics into the Danish language, among others The Yellow Emperors Classic Of Internal Medicine (Huang Di Nei Jing), The Classic Of The Difficult Issues (Nan Jing), Lao Tse: Dao De Jing, The Secret Of The Golden Flower. He has written several introductory books about Classical Chinese Medicine and Daoisme, and newly he has published the book Tao, Zen & Østens indsigt. Rytmen og energien i dit liv. Klassiske kilder, ny indsigt (Tao, Zen & The Wisdom of the East. The Rhythm and Energy in Your Life. Old Sources, New Knowledge), NordØsten Forlag 2005 (www.sitecenter.dk/nordosten/nordstenforlag). Coauthors on this book: Sten Svensson and Petra Vestergaard Pedersen.

Hugo Hørlych Karlsen has recently had a series of articles in the periodical Mit Helbred (My Health) (www.mit-helbred.dk) about Four Pillars in Chinese astrology.
A basic source for the articles was The Complete Idiot's Guide to Feng Shui by Elizabeth Moran, Josph Yu og Val Biktashev, Alpha Books, second edition, 2002.
After having studied the new third edition of The Complete Idiot's Guide to Feng Shui, Hugo Hørlych Karlsen wrote the following information to the readers of Mit Helbred (My Health):

NB: Chinese Astrology. The Four Pillars

By Hugo Hørlych Karlsen

For those readers who may be interested in the making of and the interpretation of The Four Pillars in Classical Chinese Astrology, I like to give the following supplementing information to my series of articles about The Four Pillars that were finished in the last number of My Health (Mit Helbred).
Among my main sources were The Complete Idiot's Guide to Feng Shui by Elizabeth Moran, Josph Yu and Val Biktashev, Alpha Books, second edition, 2002.
This was the absolute main source.
I want to stress, that now a third, revised edition has been published.
The book has two main sections. The first is about Classical Feng Shui, the other is about The Four Pillars.
In part one there now is a shorter description of The Eight Houses, but a more detailed description of personal traits and new information in the chapters about The Flying Stars.
In part two about The Four Pillars there is a new and extended description - there are more keys of interpretation.
For those who are interested in The Four Pillars I can recommend this third edition most whole heartedly, even if you should already have the second edition.
If you do not have the second edition and want the third, I would simply recommend you to take both the second and the third edition, as the omissions in the one edition are supplemented by supplementing chapters in the other edition.
The best thing will be to read the second edition, and then repeat by reading the third edition.
By doing so one gets a very nuanced, in depth going and useful description - theoretically highlighting and practical to use directly in ones own life.

Hugo Hørlych Karlsen,

A complete idiote, supported by idiots, wrote this book. - Rated
It is not a guide for an idiot = someone who knows nothing about Feng Shui, but a guide who starts by telling you that you are an idiot on Feng Shui - if you cannot answer the test on page 4. Even with the right answer list, you are not sure why the answer you gave was wrong or a lucky guess. So the books starts off offending you righ away and the irritation builds up as you read.

What Feng Shui is, as described in the book, is two different ways of doing Feng Shui, so the confusion builds up even more.
All houses are shown with the door in the same place and in my case some of the areas were in fact situated in my nabours house, or in the staircase.

The book is complicated to read, because it gives you a lot of smart descriptions of what Feng Shui is not, but you have to dig long to find what it really is. When you finally get a little insigth the book goes over board in details that might help the person who wants to go over board in Feng Shui, while building their own home.

A few drawings showing the right placement for bed and working table was good, but sadly standing out alone.

I can only recommend this book for a Feng Shui fanatic, who has read a lot of books on Feng Shui previously, and who wants the odd angle and a lot of smart remarks, otherwise, avoid it - because you will hate it.

A doomed relationship??!! - Rated
Within minutes of opening this book I made the slightly disturbing discovery that I was completely incompatible with my husband! Although not coming as a total surprise, I was unaware that our relationship fell into the "death and destruction" category. Any changes made to the layout of our home to increase MY luck would therefore result in a trip to A & E for my other half. The only apparent solution is to live in separate houses, which seems a little extreme.

If your partner's year of birth is 4, 12 or 20 years either side of yours, then you will find this book a complete waste of money, unless you actually wish to bring them bad luck and injury!

As if anyone would want to do that......

If you want to learn feng shui, this book is a must! - Rated
This book cuts through all the "hype" and has got to be one of the greatest books on feng shui ever written in English and for sure the best on classical/traditional feng shui.

After reading numerous books on feng shui, I wondered who is "interpreting" this already complicated topic correctly. After eventually discovering traditional feng shui and though still a very complex topic Moran, Masters Yu and Biktashev brought the loose ends together.

They left absolutely nothing unanswered; the fundamentals, the eight houses, the flying stars, the four pillars of destiny and everything in between. Loaded with humorous anectdotes, bits of wisdom and facts it is not only a must for every feng shui library, it's also very enjoyable reading.