I am having quite a difficult time to "label" this book... I opted for "home and garden" because it's the closest category I could find, but it is far from ideal! Anyway... the blurb says:

Knitters have been spotted in parliament, in pubs, on the train, at the cricket. And they're not just little old ladies. These are young, sassy, professional gals (and guys!). What is going on here?

Join Sharon Aris, intrepid journalist and novice knitter, in this light-hearted, fun and philosophical look at why knitting is back in fashion. Share in her sometimes frustrating and often hilarious attempts to master this lost art and meet the fabulous folk who populate the quirky, creative and always inspiring brave new world of wool.

As she journeys into knitting heartland, Sharon answers questions like "Is it okay to knit in public?" and, "Should one share needles?"
Ultimately, she shows how you can knit your way to happiness and a truly better way of life.

I am in the middle of reading this, a few pages a day just before sleeping, but it is the type of book that can be picked up and put down any time, as there are no true chapters to be read to the end, more of a collections of sayings, anedoctes, A&Qs, excerpts from the author's diary... very much fun to read!

Once I am done with it, I will make another more complete JE and offer it as a ring for the UK only. I know there are people out there who will be interested, LOL!

This has proved to be both educational and fun to read. The fun bits of course are the diary excerpts, very funny indeed! For a knitter that has had needles on her hands since the late 70s I could relate to the tales of the knitting craziness in the 80s, when everyone seemed to knit and even in Italy there were many knitting shops. However, I have kept up with my knitting, although not on a everyday basis, throughout the 90s, when the knitting wasn't so in anymore - it actually did not occur to me that it was no longer fashionable, and back then I was living in Germany and you could find everywhere wool, both in specialised craft shops (my fav one was about 50% yarns and 50% patchwork quilting stuff in Neuburg on the Danube).
However, coming from a country where I have never seen a man knitting, I remember being impressed to say the least when seeing a few boys knitting during lessons at the University in Germany. I guess it's the macho mentality (or alpha male, like Sharon puts it!)that prevent the Italians to try to knit.
I found the biographies of the people interviewed quite interesting, especially how these people got involved in the new wool renaissance in Australia and worldwide. I've got now a few new ideas to try out, in addition to those I got a year ago, when I participated to a Louisa Harding workshop on creativity, however I won't go as far as knit a house cosy...LOL!
I cannot say much on the patterns at the end of the book, as I haven't tried any, but maybe if some of the participants to the ring try some, it would be nice to get some feedback :)

The book is now ready to travel and visit a few knitters... off we go:

perditaxknit (Sheffield)
soulbalm (Edinburgh)
AnglersRest (Teignmouth)
Laura0141 (Glasgow)
WelshHelen (Dunstable)
LyzzyBee (Birmingham)

and back to me!

Oops, sorry for not journalling this when it arrived.

I found this book rather irksome I'm afraid! While I also liked the diary excerpts of this person's personal experiences, I found the agenda of the book offputting.

I think probably most of the problem is that it was published in 2003 - when the knitting revival was new and exciting and novel. Since then the media has done to death 'knitting as the new yoga' and celebrities knitting and knitting in pubs, always from exactly the same angle. Knitting was uncool in the past. Everyone who knitted in the past had no taste. Now successful people knit (cue 4,000 interviews with PAs and Human Resources Managers and Businesswomen). You should too! Maybe when this book came out these kind of ideas were more novel, but now it just seems that journalists writing about knitting see the chance of a quick buck and chance to go on about how much better women are now than in the past. I find these ideas pretty disrespectful to all the fabulous women who contributed to a craft through the past, without whom we would not have a clue what to do with our sticks and string. If I were a grandmother being constantly told that modern day knitting is far too cool, innovative and exciting for me, I would be seriously offended. There is a great essay about this on Brenda Dayne's Cast On podcast here.

What else annoyed me? The attempts to tie in knitting with feminism. I mean, really. How on earth can one link making stuff out of string with male/female equality? I knit cos it's fun, not because it's a political statement and not because celebrities are doing it.

The constant use of Australian slang irked me too, especially 'daggy'.

All this being said, I did like the interviews that weren't with Shiny Thirty-Something Career Success Stories, with the mill owners and the lady who's knitting helped her get over her chronic illness. I also liked the factual titbits scattered around the book.

I think, were I asked to recommend a book that accurately portrayed the resurgence in knitting, I would instead recommend people to read knitting blogs and listen to some of the fabulous knitting podcasts that are out there. That way you can see what the real people are doing, not what journalists think they should be.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to read this book YowlYY (and the cute bunny postcard)! I'm sorry I ranted about it quite so much :D

Arrived safely with me in Edinburgh. Thanks! x

A quick light read, perfect for a long train journey (which I had yesterday!). Strangely it didn't make me want to knit more (ok, I already have a couple of works in progress, so it's actually a good thing that I don't want to knit more new things). And I haven't yet found a local knitting group, and reading this has has vaguely made me think about trying to find one (or starting one) again. We'll see. There always seem to be other priorities!
I've PM'd Welshhelen to get her address to send it on.
Thanks YowlYY for the ring, all in all I'm glad to have read this little book.

Eeek! I'm SO sorry this has taken so long to get from my bookshelf to an envelope and into the post. But it's on its way to Anglers Rest at last.
Enjoy!

Arrived today; it is official - I'm in bookring frenzie, with now 10 books here, all arriving in the last week. This though will be a quickish read as I have a feeling it will jump the ring queue!

An amusing and light hearted look at knitting. For me it was nice that it focused on knitting in Australia, a Country close to my heart. It didn't make we want to rush out and grab my needles, but it did make me realise that I miss my Aussie family more than I thought! - I enjoyed the mini biographies of those being interviewed and it was good to get pointers towards mailing lists and web sites.

In the post this week to Laura0141.

Receivied with thanks.

As luck would have it, I'm needing to start a new book this evening and this will be it :)

This is a fascinating survey of the modern-day Australian knitting scene. Aris incorporates her own knitting history with that of knitting in general, going right back to its somewhat uncertain origins and on through the boom-bust-boom of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Amusing in part, the book looks at knitting from a feminist perspective - much in the style of Debbie Stoller. Aris visits all areas of the knitting world - from traditional woolen mills to a pub knitting circle - in a way that makes my fingers itch to knit.

---

PMed welshhelen for addy.

On way to welshhelen - apologies for delay.

Arrived on Thursday - thanks, Laura :-)

Firstly, I must apologise for the length of time I've had this book. One of the reasons is that I got quite irritated with it part-way through but didn't want to just abandon reading it.

Like perditaxknit, the whole "Shiny Thirty-Something Career (tm perditaxknit) women who knit and are saving the craft single-handedly" attitude really irked me as well as the, "I went to a meeting but it was only full of grannies knitting baby jumpers." It was so disrespectful to women who have knitted for years, ignoring any fads which come and go with great alackrity, but keeping the craft alive.

I much prefer Stephanie Pearl-McPhee's attitude of, "You knit! Fantastic! Isn't it fun?!" without having to analyze why (or even where) we knit.

Having said that, I did enjoy the diary entries, purely because they seemed more "down to earth". All in all, not impressed, I'm afraid.

I've requested LyzzyBee's address and it'll be in the post as soon as I get it. Thanks so much for sharing, YowlYY :-)

Aha - I wonder how many more of anglersrest's ring-frenzy books I have had or will get!

Arrived today. I have to admit that I totally failed when I tried to learn to knit a while ago (I can make curtains and do complicated cross-stitching for goodness sakes!!) so hopefully this will both entertain and inspire...

A nice jolly, easy read. Yes, it's a bit old hat and there are maybe too many stories about executive women, but the general tone is good and the stories well told. I was amazed (although not surprised) that a lot of the talk about knitting came from a PR company in the pay of a wool company, or that's how it seemed. Also touched by the mention of the Knitting For Penguins campaign - we talked about that at Birmingham BookCrossing and ended up knowing a dear lady, Anne, unfortunately now no longer with us, and setting up our Indian Library Fund with the same fundraising pages.

I have to say that I get incredibly stressed trying to knit (I'm OK when being taught, but revert back to hopeless once I'm on my own), and I thought the book could have had a basic how-to in the back as well as the patterns. One day I'll manage it!

Anyway - thanks for including me! Yowlly, if you could email me your address (email addy on my profile) then I'll get it posted back to you asap.

RELEASE NOTES:

Mailing back to YowllY today!

The book is back home :) Thanks to all for joining in and your comments, it was interesting to see what you got from this read. Now I think I will let the book travel to Italy to a new knitter...

Got it a few days got, but didn't have time to journal it... hope YowlYY will forgive me. It was part of a wonderful birthday present, and I was thinking to read this book and knit with the yarn YowlYY sent me at the same time... :-)
Thanks for the lovely surprise!