Ivy’s Vine

Book Review: Hooked For Life

June 24th, 2009

I just finished reading Hooked for Life: Adventures of a Crochet Zealot by Mary Beth Temple, and I’m sort of mixed on this one.  I liked most of it.  She has a real love of her craft, and that comes through in her work.  She has a decent sense of humor, and she weaves a good yarn as it were.  I especially like her walkthrough of a day in the life of a crochet designer.  I will never forget “chimp work”.

There are just four points I’d like to debate.

First, she seems to think that knitters look down on crocheters.  I’ve heard this many times, and I’m bewildered where it comes from.  Yes, there was that one yarn store in Florida where the owner could not accept that I both knit and crochet, but that’s Florida.  I can count the number of times anything I’ve ever encountered in Florida made sense on one finger or less.

When I hung out with the group at St. Francis, the knitters and the crochets sat together, and the conversation sounded like:

“That’s a pretty color?”
“What are you making?”
“I haven’t seen your daughter in a while. How is she?”

When I was with the craft group at Lunacon the conversation sounded like:

“That’s a pretty color?”
“What are you making?”
“Did you catch the panel on zombie preparedness?”

The photos of the group over at Trinity Church has knitters and crochets sitting together, hanging out, seeming to be chatting amiably.

I think part of this stems from the fact that knitters always try to teach crochets how to knit. It’s nothing against crochet; we try to teach everyone how to knit. Pretty much, if you’re breathing, you’re fair game.  Crocheters are easier targets because A- they probably have a decent yarn stash already. B- they already understand things like gauge and dye lot and how to tension the yarn.  C- They’re not going to gripe about how they have no time, then stare blankly out the bus window for 45 minutes.

Second, she claims that crochet is better than knitting for community projects, because crochets can make rectangles to sew together, while knitters have to pass the project around to let everyone do a few rows.  I think she was kidding.  For anyone who wants to try to either knit or crochet rectangles to sew together for a blanket, Warm Up America has rectangle patterns.  Shh. Don’t tell the Crochet Liberation Front, but many groups sew the knit and the crocheted rectangles together in one blanket.

Third, she claims that, aside from a few pamphlets, hers is the only crochet book.  Hooked for Life was published in April 2009.  Prior to that we saw Debbie Stoller’s, Stitch ‘N Bitch Crochet: The Happy Hooker published in March 2006, Crochet Liberation Front First Ever Book published in September 2008,  Contemplative Crochet: A Hands-On Guide for Interlocking Faith & Craft published in November 2008, and many more.
There is even a series of crochet mysteries, the first of which is Hooked on Murder published in May 2008.  Crocheters have plenty to read.

Forth, she raised the point to dispute a myth that crocheters are cheap. Honestly, that’s not a myth I heard about crochet until the crocheters complained about it.  These are the ones I know, and I think some of them are true.

Crochet takes more yarn than knitting.  This only holds if the pattern and drape are similar.  Knitted cables will take more yarn than crocheted lace.  You can easily demonstrate the knitting takes a lot more yarn than crochet if you make two items the same size, one crochet with a size N hook and the other knit with size 0000 needles.

Crochet is faster than knitting.  This also holds if the pattern and drape are similar.  Knitting with size 35 needles will go much faster than crocheting with a size 14 steel hook.

As a side note, what is it with crochet hook sizes?  Aluminum hooks go up in number as they get larger, and steel hooks go up in number as they get smaller.  So a size 7 aluminum doesn’t fall between a size 0 and a size 14; it’s bigger than both.  And why do we insist on calling the hooks used for yarn “aluminum” when many of them are made of bamboo or other woods?  Seriously, crochet needs some help with the naming systems.  Let’s just standardize what we mean by “double crochet” first, though.  Right now, it’s a very different stitch depending on whom you ask.

Moving on to the third “myth”, all crochet stitches are balanced.  This means that, unlike some knit patterns like stockinette, there are no crochet patterns that roll.  The stitch pulls evenly in all directions.  While it is true to my experience that all crochet stitches are balanced, I can’t really say the same for all crocheters, myself included.

Overall, I give this book a 4 out of 5.

Entry Filed under: Crochet, Reading