Books/Internet: Origami

One of my hobbies (other than reading of course) is origami. I’ve been fascinated by it for years. One day, while in college, I came home from classes and sat down on my couch (which my roommate and I had saved from the trash in front of someone’s home). I had a bowl of cereal and I started to watch Levar Burton on Reading Rainbow. The show was about Japan and they did some origami. That was 20 years ago and I’ve been hooked ever since.

Anyway, I often find myself in a book store looking over their origami book selection and I over hear a parent and a child trying to select an origami book. Other times an adult will ask me straight out what a good book might be… Here’s the rub. My answer or comment (to the parent) is always: “Go to the Web.” It’s not that I don’t want them to buy the book and help authors of origami books. Actually I do want them to do just that, but I want them to do it with some experience under their belts.

The Internet is packed with great sites which offer the beginner lots of chance to try out origami and learn a little before they start buying books. I’d rather these fresh minds get a feel for what they like and what they don’t before plunking down the green. Then the person can buy a book that they will really enjoy and not just a book that I might recommend to someone who hasn’t done it before.

In this spirit, I thought I would point out some really good origami sites for anyone who reads this and would like to start doing one of the most fascinating art forms in the world.

http://dev.origami.com/diagram.cfm - This is a site which has loads of diagrams which range from very simple to extremely complex.

http://www.origami-resource-center.com/free-origami-diagrams.html - The Origami Resource center also offers hundreds of instructional diagrams ranging in difficulty from easy to hard.

http://www.origami-club.com/en/- Origami Club is an excellent site for beginners. It offers models which range fro easy to moderate and has a delightful selection of nice looking traditional and new designs.

http://www.oriland.com/index.asp - Oriland is probably my all time favorite site for beginners. It’s extremely well done and has many new models which are very easy to learn.

http://www.origamivideo.net/ - Origami Video is a great site which has tried to collect video lessons of origami from sources throughout the web.

These are some great sites to get anyone started… from there I hope you all go out and support the publishers of origami books by buying some of them. I’ll suggest some of my favorites another day.

Book Review: Aylmer Vance: Ghost-seer

Aylmer Vance: Ghost-seer (Mystery & Supernatural): Ghost-seer (Mystery & Supernatural)… by Alice Askew; Claude Askew
I’ve been picking up all the books in the series as they show up in the used bookstore near my home. So, I bought this one as well. I started reading it shortly after purchasing it, because it sounded like it would be a bit like Sherlock Holmes investigates supernatural cases. At the time that concept sounded appealing. However, it just didn’t pan out. The stories in this collection were mildly interesting at best. They did little to capture the imagination and for short stories they sure did seem to drag on.

That said, I did find the final story (The Fear) well worth the rest of the book. “The Fear” was a great little ghost story which made my hair stand on end a couple of times while reading it. It was good at building suspense and keeping it going for the entire story until near the end. Sadly even this story had a large fault. The ending didn’t live up to the rest of the story. But even with that problem this one story was really good. I can’t say I’d recommend this book to anyone, but I would recommend the story “The Fear”.