All Wound Up
Stephanie Pearl-McPhee

This book is about as far from Paranormal Romance as you could get, and yet I loved every moment of it.

Should a humorous book filled with essays on knitting and the life of a knitter be life changing? Well, no, no it shouldn’t be… but it was certainly a profound moment in my life. Like discovering your place in the world, finding a kindred spirit, all that sort of thing… I discovered the sock. And I’m now an addict.

If you’ve ever had your friends and family look at you funny for *always* having your hobby in your handbag at all times, you’re going to get a kick out of this book too; whether you’re a knitter, crochet, or just never go anywhere without a book, all of us ‘hobby obsessed’ will be able to relate to the stories in All Wound Up.

There is a lot of talk about socks in this book, as Stephanie never goes anywhere without at least a sock to knit, and you know what? It had never occurred to be to actually knit socks! Jersey’s , booties, hats, ... yes, but I’ve never knit a sock. So this book turned my rather spotty knitting history into an obsession and my obsessive addictive personality shined while knitting my first ever pair of socks (and they’re wearable! If you don’t look too hard).

All Wound Up is mostly a very light-hearted look at life through the eyes of the knitting obsessed, but also explores the point behind knitting (-30c Canadian winters), basic survival in the snow, raising teens and hiding the level of your yarn addiction (which the reader in me roared with laughter at… smuggle books? Me? Oh, no, never!).

"...as I stood in my wedding dress, looking nervous, my friend Denny took my bouquet and replaced it with her knitting and asked if I waited to "do a few lines to take the edge off." ...

This was the first book I’ve read by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, and I am not going to go out and obsessively buy the rest of her collection, and try and force the rest of the non-addicted world to read this and laugh as hard as I did,  and although I spent most of my time replacing ‘knitting’ with ‘romance books’ the idea around realizing you’re not the only one with your peculiar addiction, and the difficulties in trying to explain your addiction to those that just don’t get it (so I walk and read, so what, I can see where I’m going… and I put my book down to cross traffic, unlike you with your ipod).

As a sometimes failed knitter, I could relate to the knitting stories (or at least understand them), but it was more the humour, personality and style of writing that really made this book so enjoyable.

“ My real personality is intolerant, impatient, judgmental, and possibly dangerous. It's like knitting surrounds me with some kind of science fiction bubble of kindness or patience that's activated by yarn."

I have since read the comment that if you’ve been following her blog (which I am now an addicted reader of www.yarnharlot.ca) many of the stories have already appeared. And it’s true. There are many of the same stories in this book as you can find on her blog, BUT, on the blog they’re just randomly inserted at around the time they happened. It’s a blog, there is little editing, and little flow, other than by date. Whereas when they’re all compiled into the book there is a sense of flow, in both time and topic. Additional bits to the story have been added. And you’re not wading through book tour shout outs and hellos or holiday pictures and the like. What you’ve got is a few hundred pages of normally hilarious, sometimes sad, but always clever writing.

“I have been the victim of some knitting related crimes that would have resulted in life sentences for the yarn involved, were it not inanimate. (It is extremely difficult to prove motive and intent for a crime if everyone keeps telling you that the perpetrator isn't alive)"