About.com Rating

The Knitting Memories audiobook version includes the stories of more than a dozen knitters and "experiencers of knitting," including designers and people who live with knitting.

The four-hour, four CD set (abridged from the print version), read by Kymberly Dakin, covers a wide range of emotions having to do with knitting, from the bliss of getting to live with yarn every day to the frustration of making a living from knitting, using knitting to get through depression and the death of a loved one, and using knitting to remember a trip, welcome a child or pass on family history.

What Knitting Means

There are stories on the audio about a wide range of knitting and knitting-related topics, including:

• trying to decipher the different swatches on a charm afghan
• knitting a map of Paris
• what to do with knitting "chestnuts," projects you can't bear to let go of even though they're horrible, dated or even unfinished
• the perils of yarnielpsy, characterized by blacking out in yarn stores only to emerge with way too much fiber
• the joy of yarn nirvana, or making a living in the yarny arts (this one is by Clara Parkes and traces the roots of her website, Knitter's Review)
• how knitting and spinning can change the way we approach life
• the history (real and imagined) of a passed-down sweater
• keeping a legacy of knitwear
• using knitting to protect those we love
• using knitting to overcome depression and other problems
• a brush with a knitting celebrity
• the perils of knitting for money
• being jealous of knitting

The stories deal with learning to knit, fiber obsessions, what knitting means to knitters and favorite projects.

Some of the stories are funny (like Lily Chin's description of working so hard to meet a knitting deadline her husband literally fed and dressed her), some heartwarming (the tale of a family of ski sweaters now decorating a guest bedroom) and some sad (a woman's story of knitting a shawl through her mother's final illness).

Bottom Line

Some of the stories are quite long, and it's easy to drift in and out of listening if you're working on something else while you're listening. That's not entirely a bad thing, because it gives you a reason to listen to the audio again sometime, which is rarely the case.

Not all of the stories from the original book are included in the audio version, so it's also worth checking out the print version if you find you like the stories that are included here.

Knitting Memories is full of stories that will make you appreciate on a deeper level what it means to be a knitter, what stories we are leaving behind in our stitches and how being a knitter changes the way we think about the world.

Publisher's website



Disclosure: A review copy was provided by the publisher. For more information, please see our Ethics Policy.