the story behind the things we buy

If you are looking for a quick way to learn more about the way things are made, and discarded, like cosmetics, plastic bags, chocolate, how they affect the environment and what we can do to lower our waste and increase our health, check out Good Stuff? - A Behind-the-Scenes Guide to the Things We Buy.
(http://www.worldwatch.org/taxonomy/term/44)

Published by the World Watch Organization, it is a free download-able booklet which devotes one page to each of its 24 categories.

Quick and easy to read, it satisfies the first flush of curiosity about the things in our everyday life that we often don't give enough thought to.