I saw this book in one of the British cross stitch magazines that I read and spent most of the last year dying for a copy. I broke down and ordered myself one after Christmas and it finally came. I'm glad I didn't pay full price for it- the stitch designs themselves are adorable and look fairly simple, and the illustrations are beautiful. The problems I have with the book are as follows:
A: somewhat odd layout. First, you have to flip through 30 or so pages of pictures of finished designs. Again, they're lovely, and I'd adopt the little girl used in many of the shots in a heartbeat if she's as sweet as she looks, but I don't know that I'd start the book that way if I were packaging it.
B: The middle section is instructions on how to make/finish the projects as illustrated in the first section. Not a bad idea, but when the instructions for making a pennant say things like "Make a pennant. Patch your stitched design onto it," I don't find that to be helpful. More like VERY annoying.
C: The patterns finally make an appearance, 50 or so pages into the book! They look simple, nothing too complex, and then you look at the color chart on the side of each page. Most stitchers know how to match the symbols to the color palette given. The problem is when you have symbols with no corresponding color, which I noticed on several of them. Luckily I'm smart enough (I think!) to pick out shades that will work when I try to do those patterns, but it IS annoying.
All in all, it's a nice book- just buy yourself a used copy if you can find one, because it is NOT worth the $32 list price!
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