This book makes me want to move to Denmark! The photos of the countryside, cozy indoor scenes, and comforting food and drinks are gorgeous and inviting. The recipes are easy to follow and the ideas for decor, and of rituals and traditions to start in your own life make this a perfect book to gift a friend or yourself.
Thanks to NetGalley for the free e-galley in exchange for an honest review.

This book was fab with all its ideas and recipes as well as being full of information! I will definitely be incorporating some of the things from inside.

This book has explanations of the Scandinavian concept of hygge, a warm, cozy lifestyle, and includes recipes.

So enjoyed this book as I believe in the Scandinavian way of life and home.

I've read several books about the lifestyle of Hygge and unfortunately, this was not the best one I've read. Too many recipes and not enough focus on what Hygge actually is and how to incorporate it into your life. I grew up in Minnesota...where I feel that I grew up with Hygge as a by-product of the strong Scandinavian influence in my state and in my family. It's a lifestyle I've tried to incorporate into my lifestyle in Oregon. I feel that I have been successful in bringing this into my home and my attitude...but it is difficult to bring into the workplace...which is what I would really like to learn more about. The book is ok and has some excellent examples and tips...but with so many books out right now due to the "trendiness" of Hygge...I think there are better books if you are truly wanting to learn about it.

I received a copy of this title from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review

Wonderfully composed with an array of recipes and hygge tips; some of which are as simple as "pack light" when travelling and call your bank if you go abroad, which, I guess makes for a cozy life? But. honestly, who is really coming to the hygge party for tips like that - you want gorgeous pictures, and comforting food, and some pretty blonde people in sweaters looking at you from the dust jacket. This brings it in spades!

It's officially late November, which for those in the middle of the United States means there will soon be cold temperatures and potential white stuff falling from the sky. It's time to stay indoors and find warmth. It's time for the Nordic idea of coziness, aka hygge. And to help you immerse yourself in coziness, The Hygge Life offers up recipes, ideas for decorating, themes to use for entertaining, and rituals and traditions you can make your own. 

Blending ideas of self-care, sanctuary, and intimacy, The Hygge Life brings together everything you need to create a cozier life. Icelandic chef Gunnar Karl Gislason has an award-winning restaurant, and his co-author Jody Eddy is an author and former editor of Art Culinaire. Together they have created this beautifully photographed handbook packed with inspiring ideas for making life warmer, simpler, and more connected to nature and to family and friends. 

The recipes range from easy and tasty starts to the day to simple weeknight dinners to meals for gatherings and holidays. For breakfast, try Spiced Buttermilk Fritters, Steel-Cut Oatmeal with Yogurt and Spiced Roasted Apples, or Kleinur (Icelandic beignets). End your average Thursday with Salmon with Baby Potatoes and Pine or Braised Pork Tenderloin with Oyster Mushrooms and Parsnips, or even Fried Fish with Almonds and Capers. 

When it's time to invite others over for a celebration, Gislason and Eddy offer ideas for movie nights, game nights, pizza parties, bonfires, and cocktail parties. There are recipes for Lamb Stew, Ginger Cookies, and Glogg as well as popcorn toppings and how to make your own bitters, so whether your party is just a handful of close friends or a large group of extended family, you can be ready to invite them in to a warm and comforting place and offer them layers of coziness, great food, laughter, and togetherness. 

And then when the wanderlust hits, as it does after being cooped up in the colder months, The Hygge Life even offers ideas for getting out with hygge. A creative picnic, doing some gardening, hiking, taking a train ride, or even traveling with children--all these and more are covered in coziness in this gorgeous book. Perfect as a holiday gift for someone you love, or even better for yourself, The Hygge Life can help you create a warm, nourished, and nourishing life for yourself and for those you love. 



Galleys for The Hygge Life were provided by Ten Speed Press through NetGalley, with many thanks.

As someone who has suffered from Seasonal Affective Disorder her whole life (long before it had a name!), the idea of actually looking forward to winter is almost alien to me. However, in my desperation for anything to improve my spirits during these dark months, I wanted to explore the concept of hygge. This book is exactly what I was looking for!

The Scandinavians have learned over the centuries of very dark winters how to not only survive but to thrive. And it all begins with taking care of one’s self and caring for others, actively finding (making) comfort in everything one does. It’s much more than interior decorating, cozy fires, or fuzzy socks. Rather, it’s a purposeful communion of spirits in pursuit of that caring for and comforting one another. This book contains gorgeous photography, warm explanations of background and philosophy, and several recipes of Scandinavian comfort food. I can see why hygge is becoming an international sensation!

Maybe by implementing some of these suggestions and rituals, I hope to be able to combat the winter blues better this year!

I gratefully received this book as an eARC from the author, publisher and NetGalley in exchange for my unbiased review.

How do you balance your life! Well this book show you how the Danish do it. Inside by the fire or outside by the campfire, blankets, drinks, and food. Over 30 recipes, all look wonderful. Great photographs, amazing book!

The Hygge Life Embracing the Nordic art of coziness through recipes entertaining, decorating, simple rituals and family traditions by Gunnar Karl Gislason & Jody Eddy is a warm book about Nordic traditions In Winter-Time that lands don't see any kind of light for example but people not only are not discouraged but plenty of enthusiasm for enjoying time with family and friends, for staying together and for trying to create wonderful moments to remember forever.
The word hygge for example means taking care of yourself and your dear ones.

Translated, the word means: "coziness" although for Scandinavian it doesn't just mean creating a warm and inviting space.

Hygge it's an attitude for Scandinavian: it's that "feeling cozy from the inside out" says the author so that wherever people go they transmit happiness and joy. A positive attitude.

This book was born not just for Scandinavians: they know the meaning of a hygge life, but for all the rest of the people in the world. A special warm guide for taking good care of yourself and your dear ones.
Hygge means says the author: "Illuminating your world with value and grace." If you give importance at these two words in your life you won't never get lost.


Of course all recipes in this book are strictly Scandinavians but it's possible of course to copy some of them, and to enjoying the great advice of this book. What I loved the most reading The Hygge Life was to discover this sensation of attention, warm, cure for every details, because love means to sharing our devotion to others, to being there to others also for just an evening or a lunch or a special moment in our life curing particulars, details in the house, meals.

You will discover the main passion-beverages of Scandinavians, coffee and tea and how they love to drink them with a lot of suggestions!
but also how to take care of yourself, how to organize memorable home meals during the weekend, or for a special movie night.

I found interesting and so funny the Hygge pizza party. All the participants will cook their own pizza! and it seems great. No one will complain ;-)
At the end of the book great advice regarding gardening and for children how to raise a butterfly!
What a magic!
Highly recommended.

I thank NetGalley and Ten Speed Press for this beautiful eBook!

The Hygge Life was the perfect lifestyle book to read at the beginning of the autumn. It mixes in a perfect manner Scandinavian lifestyle guide and recipes. Tips for hygge gathering and activities juxtaposed with the delicious sounding recipes and some beautiful photos brings for a reading experience covering all senses.

This is a delightful book full of cozy home decor ideas, great comfort food recipes and ideas for creating your own Hygge home environment. The descriptions are easy to follow and a wonderful addition to any happy home. For those of us that have happy homes and appreciate a comfortable atmosphere, this is a wonderful read. I highly recommend this book for those seeking to improve their home during the cold winter months. Denmark and Finland have been creating Hygge homes for decades and this book is proof that it works. I will enjoy very much incorporating all the elements into my own winter paradise indoors.

There are certain trends that I can easily dismiss and others like hygge that I want to bath in almost exclusively. Hygge is a optimistic Kool-Aid worth drinking from home decor to meals with more than just an embracing of the darkest months of the year but also an ideology that celebrates the potentially mundane and adds whisps of aesthetically place metaphorical glitter!!!

Winters are long and dark in the North Europe therefore the need to create home-based alternatives for avoiding the feeling of loneliness and deep depression created by the weather. It means more than the usual light therapy practiced intensively in countries like Finland or Norway, but offering an entire concept of alternative lifestyle which is not necessarily geographically confined.
Welcome to the world of hygge, a Danish word meaning 'coziness', adopted in the world language of good life seekers as '(...) the art of creating intimacy and the comforting sense of togetherness in a candlelight room with a fire cracking and cheerful music playing in the background'. It also means 'that taking care of yourself and those you love fortifies you with an invincible sense of well-being that no amount of snow or endless twilight can temper'.
My experience of living for the last 10 years in Germany was a long lesson in learning to deal with the dark hours starting around 4pm in December and a cold weather which means also getting used with snow in April. I visited the Sweden and Norway too and more than once had the feeling of being overwhelmed by too much darkness. Until I discovered that with friends and some interesting book and a good meal life can be better again.
The Hygge Life, written together by the Icelandic chef Gunnar Karl Gislason and Jody Eddy, is more than an introduction to this lifestyle. It offers the full to-do-list to achieve the piece and wellbeing so much associated with this part of Europe, regardless what side of the world you are. It means that you can easily make a lap forward leaving behind your home door all the problems and difficult times, with a touch of style and inspiration.
From the early morning - what about starting your early day with a hike? - until you are ready for the cozy movie or game evening, you are guided how to achieve peace and inner happiness. The book offers smart practical advice about the choices of coffee - no wonder now that the Scandinavian countries are so big coffee consumers - or a tea, the breakfast - possibly in bed - and the brunch - without or (preferably) with friends. You are offered a big number of inspiring recipes - my favorites so far I would love to try are: pancakes with berries and whipped cream, salmon with baby potatoes and pine, fried fish with almonds and capers, fennel salad with blue cheese and walnut - but also ideas about how to better take care of yourself - by paying a visit to the spa, for instance. Because: 'You can best nurture others when you have carved out the time to care for yourself'.
This book is one of the many published lately about this praised lifestyle. The more the merrier as some of us need to be reminded constantly about the everyday beauty and easy way the life can be lived. Dark day or sunny day, it is important to live it at its fullest. What I am planning to do today, and tomorrow and the day after tomorrow too.

I received a copy of this book from Netgalley in exchange for a fair review.

Wow this was a really neat book. Gorgeous photography, historical and cultural information as well as fairly simple to follow recipes. I enjoyed reading about the holidays and rituals that are important to the author: the book felt very honest and interesting.
I also appreciated the recipes in the book (the warm potato salad looks like a must try) and the photography makes everything look very appetizing. The DIY recipes like aromatic sugar and bath salts are simple but neat.
This book was a real treat!

Growing up in a Swedish home, Hygge is embed into me as a person. My personality and the way I keep a home. I love seeing Hygge being embraced and learning more behind my families 'normal'.

This is a lovely book. One that I will buy for holiday/birthday gifts. I have a list of women who I plan to gift this to later this year. It's wonderful.

This book is so cozy that I wish I could crawl into the pages.

I like it. Pretty much.
Not only because of all the beautiful photos but mainly because the content is really soothing. The busy lifestyles in cities are giving people nowadays too much pressure and schedules too tight that we seem to forget the fact that life is short, life can be enjoyable, life can be beautiful. A simple cup of hot tea may be able to make a day happier, A day without TVs and cell phones may make us cherish the time spent with our families more. Why not?

However, this book focuses pretty much on food. There are over 30 recipes included......not bad, but I wish there could be more stuff unrelated to food. This is not a cookbook, after all.
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Overall: 4/5
Cover: 5/5 (So beautiful!)
Writing: 5/5
Appealing: 3.5/5
Would I recommend it? Yes.
Would I buy it? Not me, but my friend would probably buy it. The recipes do look really, really nice.

NOTE: The copy I read was called "The Hygge Life". I'm not sure if that's the new or old title.

This is more a lifestyle book, with a focus on recipes. There is a bit about what hygge actually means, but mostly it is hygge-inspired recipes.
There are over 30 recipes with simple ingredients, ranging for pancakes, to lamb stew, to non-eatables like bath salts. Now, I'm not a hygge-expert, but I feel like a lot of the recipes are debatably hygge. Food is so personal, I think it's hard to really say "this food is hygge". But there are some generally hygge goodies in here, but most of them were non-eatables (such as the bath salts, information on traditions, idea for hygge activities, etc). I wish there was more of a focus on activities and the home rather than food. But if you are into hygge and have read the basic hygge-intro titles, you might get some good ideas from this one.

**I received this copy via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review**

I'm new to the concept of hygge but know that's in been in the news a lot recently. This book give great insight into the concept but I feel the running order of the chapters could have had more structure. It didn't seem to flow right. Nevertheless, was an interesting read.