At Knit's End

August 27, 2007
Obsessive knitter Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, whose popular knitting blog ( www.yarnharlot.com
) gets 20,000 hits per day, offers her fellow knitters humorous knitting anecdotes, bits of homespun (no pun intended!) wisdom, helpful tips and little “mantras” to help keep their sanity when realizing an entire sleeve of a sweater has come out wrong and has to be redone. Even nonknitters can appreciate much of her humor—for example, her technique for “darning” socks that have holes in them, “which consists of loudly exclaiming 'DARN!' and a few other choice expletives before dropping them in the garbage.” Pearl-McPhee has a warm, engaging voice brimming with humor and often punctuated by a self-deprecating chuckle. This audiobook of her folksy ruminations would make the perfect gift for anyone who loves to knit. The print version of this title won the 2006 Benjamin Franklin Award in humor. A Storey Publishing paperback.

May 15, 2005
This small book holds a treasure of thoughts with which every knitter can identify: the frustrations of ignoring gage, the thrill of a new project, the compulsion of yarn addiction aka SABLE (stash acquisition beyond life expectation). Pearl-McPhee is a lifelong knitter whose bona fides are secured with this story: when she asked her midwife how she'd know when to summon her, the midwife answered, "When you don't feel like knitting anymore." This small paperback, which fits easily in a knitting bag, contains about 300 short anecdotes, vignettes, and pieces of advice for knitters. For some of her musings, she adds lessons learned: "I will remember that no one has ever been killed or maimed by being adventurous with knitting." Many knitters will find it a relief to read a knitting book with no patterns they feel they must try.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2005, American Library Association.)