[.ca] Flameworking: Creating Glass Beads, Sculptures & ... (ISBN 1579907415)

Great book for beginners:
From a technical perspective, this is a great how-to on flamework. Mears details many useful projects which, if mastered, can give the student a solid background from which to create more artistic and creative items. Some of the discussion on tools, a studio and other equipment is vague - she glosses over specific tools, deferring instead to the old "check with your supplier" for info on torches, tools and other items. A solid buy at this price, even better if used. She includes a section of work being done by artists around the world that really showcases both the full capability of torchwork and the creative ways in which torchwork is being used with other formats - blown glass, fused glass, painted glass and more.

Not useful for typical beginner:
The problem with this book is that, as the author states at the very beginning, this is a book for those working with hard glass using an oxygen /fuel torch. Thus for the 98% of those beginners who start with the single tank brazing fuel (e.g. MAPP gas) and therefore work with soft glass this book misses the mark. True many of the techniques are similar, but since there are many books out there that are written from the soft glass lampworking viewpoint, why spend time and money on something that misses the mark.

A lovely book for beginners in hard glass:
This book is a good introduction to working with hard glass (that is, borosilicate glass, such as Pyrex). It's beautifully photographed and nicely put together. Except as eye candy, it doesn't have much to offer flameworkers who use soft glass (soda-lime glass) unless they plan to cross over to working boro, but that's not the book's fault.

Good Read:
This book is a good read, but as a boro artist I found that it was a bit simplistic and did not cover much in the way of new techniques. Much of the book had the same design concept put together in a different way - a beginners book.