A pair of reviews of “The Anarchist’s Tool Chest” just showed up in my inbox that made me laugh.
The first one is from the gift guide by Cleveland’s The Plain Dealer newspaper. You can read the whole story here. But here’s the pertinent part of the review, which is right before they start talking about what a great tool the Dremel is:
“And for advanced, hand-tool aficionados, consider Christopher Schwartz’s 2011 book, ‘The Anarchist’s Tool Chest.’ The author’s sometimes-hokey style doesn’t take away his passion — or knowledge — for tools.”
What funny here is that every single time I have been mentioned or quoted in a newspaper, they have misspelled my last name. So much for professional courtesy.
In journalism school it was policy that if you misspelled a proper noun in a piece of writing, you failed the piece. Period. no exceptions. On the first day of the second-year Newswriting class you have to interview the instructor, who is role-playing as a police officer named John Smith, who has information on a drug bust.
The whole class failed because we didn’t ask how to spell his name, which is Jon Smythe.
The second review is from Furniture & Cabinet Making magazine in Great Britain. Vanessa Austin Locke wrote a half-page piece on the book that begins with this lament: “Men and their tools. What’s a girl to say?”
Ha! The review has a happy ending – in my book, at least.
“While I tend to focus mainly on the design-based parts of the trade, this book has really inspired me to get more hands-on and I think that’s because it comes from an aesthetic angle, which is after all the point of fine craftsmanship. This book is a lovely object, would make a wonderful present and is actually a very good read.”
— Christopher Schwarz