This is a lovely and thoughtful little (160 pages) book. I was at first a little unwilling to suspend disbelief and link knitting to life as much as the cover and other commentaries had said would happen. But in practice, Clara is a very readable writer, and has a light but serious touch. I very much enjoyed reading from cover to cover in less than a week (which is good going for me, as I currently have a pile of part-read books which is looking askance at me). Apart from knitting and yarns, there are gardening, family history and cookery involved …
There is a great discussion of knits and purls ( p. 48 public/private) which also compares right side and wrong side concepts. I don’t agree with her that purls are introvert and indeed enjoy and work faster in purl than knit and also love the variety and the drape of a mixed stitch cloth – the only good reason, apart from not being able to purl, that I can think of to work only in knit is for colour work! But it takes all sorts …
The other chapter of particular interest to me was The Dropped Stitch, which is also about friendship but discusses woollen and worsted yarns, and here I am 100% plus (!) in agreement that woollen spun yarns are totally wonderful for the longer term …
All in all, a great read – works like a series of short stories but also a series of brief biographical and philosophical pieces. It deserves to be read and reviewed beyond the knitting and yarn world. And in these electronic days, it’s also nice to have a hard-back with a paper cover, with slightly unevenly cut pages, which smells unmistakeably of book!