If you are crochet lover, then you will agree that crochet books can give you many hours of pleasure – be it through just browsing and or actually working out the patterns in it.

If you are an absolute beginner, there are a few things you need know before you buy a crochet book.

1. You’ll find basic instructions in all the books meant especially for crochet. If you are the kind of person who feels, the more difficult the pattern, the more the pleasure, then go right ahead and buy any book that captures your fancy.

2. If however, you are the type of person who can’t be bothered with elaborate instructions, then books with charts (diagrammatic representation of stitches) is your kind of thing.

3. Filet crochet – is a type of crochet that is basically made of filled and open meshes. The filled and open meshes are represented on a graph paper in the form of blocked and blank squares. There are a lot of books exclusively for filet crochet. My personal favourite is Priscilla’s yoke book. Anyone with moderate skills in crochet will find this useful. Alternately you can use cross-stitch patterns for filet crochet.

4. Irish crochet – this beautiful style of crochet is for the adventurous crochet worker. It is slow, laborious work - requiring a lot of patience - but well worth the time and effort. If you are the type who likes a quick project, this it not your cup of tea.

5. There are a lot of crochet monthly magazines that feature new techniques as they evolve in the market.

6. Finally, there are some lovely, out of print crochet books on the Public Domain from which you can download them absolutely free. http://www.antiquepatternlibrary.org/completelist.htm is a treasure trove of the best antique crochet books for free downloads.

Here are a few of my favourite books from the antique pattern library.

1. Miss. Lambert’s Crochet Sampler – a good book for beginners.
2. Priscilla’s Yoke book – for filet crochet – moderate skill level.
3. Edgings in crochet Book: 4 – for all skill levels.
4. Dillmont’s – DMC library, Irish Crochet – advanced level for the patient and adventurous types.

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