Around-the-World Art and Activities: Visiting the 7 Continents Through Craft Fun (A Williamson Little Hands Book) -

Parchment Craft Customer Review: A beautiful & very useful book for beginners and others.
This book is a delight to browse through and inspiring to work from. Like other books from Search Press, it is well laid out, with beautiful illustrations and good patterns for a wide assortment of cards and some bookmarks. Instructions are clear, and cover a wide variety of techniques which include embossing, piercing, lace work, colour techniques and adding inserts. There are additional pictures which can be photocopied and and enlarged to make additional patterns, and suggestions for making one’s own patterns. I have done some parchment craft before, but still found a lot in this book to help and inspire me. I consider it to be excellent value.

Arts and Crafts Needlepoint -

Kyuuto! Japanese Crafts! Amigurumi (Crafts) (Kyuuto! Japanese Crafts) Customer Review: Very cute indeed
These are delightful patterns. I really like the way the patterns are presented but have a criticism: There is no explanation on how to start (you have to crochet into the slip knot and pull it tight but ther is no explanation how to do this) and the first pattern I followed (small teddy bear) had a mistake in it. For an experienced crocheter no problem but for a novice of the crat offputting - which is a shame because the results are just adorable. I hope they iron out the mistakes in the next edition!
Customer Review: Cute teddies
This book is presented well and the charting used is easy to follow,however I have several complaints about this book.
Firstly it did not explain how to start the loop to begin the crochet rounds and I had to refer to another book to work this out.
Secondly the little teddy pattern has most of the pattern missing for the arms and legs so I just had to make it up to finish it, not great for a beginner! I will conceed that the finished teddy is extremely cute and has both my daughters fighting over it. Time to make another one!

Take Silk: A Guide to Silk Paper for the Creative Fibre Artist (Milner Craft) -

Top Knife: the Art and Craft of Trauma Surgery: The Art and Craft of Trauma Surgery Customer Review: Perfect introduction to trauma surgery
This book is an easy and complelling read for surgerons interested in trauma. It provides the reader with “one correct way” of doing things. Therefore it is not comprehensive nor a balanced account. However it delivers the message very effectively to those who want to learn the most important principles of trauma surgery. I you haven’t read any trauma texts previously this book is the perfect place to start.

Ribbon Embroidery and Stumpwork (Threads & Crafts) -

The Art of Parchment Craft Customer Review: Limited appeal
As a raw beginner, I found that the projects in this book were not really what I was looking for. I would have liked more variety, and in particular themed cards, such as Christmas, Easter etc.

There was a paucity of detail on how to paint or dorse projects, and I found the fact that I had to enlarge the patterns to use them very irritating. I struggled to get the size accurate using a scanner, and had to use a photocopier instead.

There are better books on the market for the price.
Customer Review: Greater starter book for parchment work
This book makes parchment work seem dead easy to the beginner which I am. It goes through the different types of parchment craft and each section has a worked example relating to the skills being used. As you move through the book the various techniques come together to produce detailed and fine parchment work. I especially liked the 3-D section because it seems a little more practical than just card making. The book review only deserves 4 stars because most of the projects are sketched in a reduced format and as this was a holiday gift book, and as I don’t have access to an enlarging photocopier - I’m a little stuck until I get to one. Overall though, a charming book making the craft look really easy and accessible.

The Craft of Stickmaking -

A Guide to Craft Brewing Customer Review: A useful guide to craft brewing in the UK
The most recent previous guide to craft brewing in the UK was published in 1993 (”Home Brewing” by Graham Wheeler) and since then there has been a huge growth in the knowledge, ingredients and equipment available to the UK craft brewer so some sort of more up to date publication was probably overdue. John Alexander does not attempt to be a simple update of the Wheeler book, even though by nature of its publication date it does to a large extent achieve this, but has written a guide based on his own long experience of craft brewing.

The science behind the brewing process is researched and described in some detail and I learnt some new facts from reading this book. Brewing beer is such an interesting process that every brewer’s experiences will differ and accordingly there will be differences in opinion on the relative importance of factors such as water quality, sparging efficiency or use of finings but it is interesting to read of one person’s own journey of brewing discovery. As long as the end result is good it hardly matters what route you take to get there although in craft brewing the journey is a large part of the fun. For me, the tendency to use Scottish terminology (”crumbs from a hop picker’s piece bag”) adds to the character of the book.

In spite of a number of small typographical errors, this book is more self-consistent and more scientifically correct than some earlier publications and is a useful addition to the craft brewer’s library.

On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft -

Polymer Clay and Mixed Media - Together at Last: Incorporating Craft Materials and Found Objects in Clay Figures

Nature’s Playground: Activities, Crafts and Games to Encourage Your Children to Enjoy the Great Outdoors -

Craft, Inc.

Imaginative Writing: The Elements of Craft (Penguin Academics) -

Kaostar!: Modern Chaos Cunning Craft

The Joy of Mixology: The Consummate Guide to the Bartender’s Craft -

The Craft of the Classroom: A Survival Guide to Classroom Management in the Secondary School Customer Review: The most helpful publication I have read
This is the most helpful publication I have read on classroom management and how to avoid problems rather than deal with them. My copy was given to me by my former headmaster when I began my teaching career sixteen years ago and I find myself quoting from it spontaneously as I guide Beginner Teachers. The advice is timeless and will help you to create a calm and orderly environment in which your pupils can learn most effectively. As Marland states, teachers are not ‘born’, they learn their skills, and this book will give trainees a headstart in doing just that.
Customer Review: Invaluable
It may look and occasionally sound (eg in its advice on what to wear) dated, but this is a wise and realistic book - I’m sure it would help PGCE students, NQTs and many others in their early years of teaching. The book’s great strength is its practical advice - few books or even courses would go into as much depth about routines of giving out books, how to set out your markbook, and how to pace yourself through the term and year, and yet these are the issues that to a great extent determine whether a young teachers succeeds or struggles. Marland offers many hints and tips, and urges you to accept them but still leaves alternatives open if they seem more appropriate. Buy it, read it, and then read it again in a few months to make sure you have imbibed all the ideas - it may make all the difference to your career.

Spell Crafts (Llewellyn’s Practical Magick) -

Can I Change Your Mind?: The Craft and Art of Persuasive Writing Customer Review: Completely persuaded
I almost never read books in one go but from the start this book just hooks you. There are two things which appealed - firstly the obvious one about showing you what it means to write persuasively. It does this rather less like an instruction manual or style guide but more as a philosophy - nothing complicated or revolutionary (but as the writer points out nothing ever is) but all the same inspirational.
Secondly I couldn’t help but like Lindsay Camp as a very witty , talented human. I did find myself asking whether I was reading the book to get some kind of value from it (ie learn to write more persuasively) or whether I was reading it because it was just enjoyable. In the end the two things merged into each other - brilliant.

Customer Review: Written communication just became much more understandable
I’ve read many books on writing and this is up there with John Simmons. If you write anything, even an e-mail to a colleague, I would suggest that you can become more effective in achieving your outcome by reading this.

Quite rightly, as Lindsay points out, most of us don’t give much of a thought to a piece of communication before we write it. This book will allow you to start to think clearer before writing. It won’t teach you grammar and punctuation but it will hopefully allow you to understand how to engage with the person (or people) at the other end.

I haven’t felt this passionately about a book for quite some time so the author can obviously walk the walk too. Highly recommended.