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Vanishing Fleece
- Adventures in American Wool
- Narrated by: Clara Parkes
- Length: 5 hrs and 55 mins
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Vanishing Fleece
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Publisher's Summary
A fast-paced account of the year Clara Parkes spent transforming a 676-pound bale of fleece into saleable yarn, and the people and vanishing industry she discovered along the way.
Join Clara Parkes on a cross-country adventure and meet a cast of characters that includes the shepherds, dyers, and countless workers without whom our knitting needles would be empty, our mills idle, and our feet woefully cold. Travel the country with her as she meets a flock of Saxon Merino sheep in upstate New York, tours a scouring plant in Texas, visits a steamy Maine dyehouse, helps sort freshly shorn wool on a working farm, and learns how wool fleece is measured, baled, shipped, and turned into skeins.
In pursuit of the perfect yarn, Parkes describes a brush with the dangers of opening a bale (they can explode), and her adventures from Maine to Wisconsin ("the most knitterly state") and back again; along the way, she presents a behind-the-scenes look at the spinners, scourers, genius inventors, and crazy-complex mill machines that populate the yarn-making industry. By the end of the book, you'll be ready to set aside the backyard chickens and add a flock of sheep instead. Simply put, no other book exists that explores American culture through the lens of wool.
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What listeners say about Vanishing Fleece
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 2021-10-28
An adventure in wool and the communities that hold it dear
Clara Parkes has crafted and narrated an exceptional volume that I looked forward to sitting with over several days. Even when not listening, her tale lingered and inspired me to carry on with my own adventure in wool. All the while listening to chapter upon chapter, I sat hand-spinning, carding and taking breaks to rinse the second last fleece shorn from a mini flock of Suffolk sheep I’d met last spring. I’ve nearly finished hand-scouring the works ( save for one final fleece). I don’t feel so alone in my unusual adventure after listening to Vanishing Fleece. This story and careful observations bring the humanity to what is often overlooked - the people behind the wool, the industry and the sheep. I couldn’t recommend this more to any reader who is interested in tales of people in a changing landscape, the creativity and perseverance they hold and at times lose. Thank you Clara, for taking the risk of the bale, your honesty, self-deprecating humour, and insights to our collective human condition.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Alexis L. Beckett
- 2020-02-16
Are you a textile maker?
I crochet. I love long form gonzo journalism. I love the history of technology. This book had it all, and thank you to the author for that.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Jennifer Dawson
- 2020-02-20
This book wool make ewe think!
This is a must-read for anyone who is at all interested in yarn crafts, sustainable fashion, and/or the made in America movement. While it is written for those uninitiated in wool production and easy to understand (no jargon!), as someone who is fairly experienced in the realm of working with wool, handspinning, and running a fibre arts business I still found this enlightening and entertaining. It is also inspiring, and I truly hope to see more of us consciously making fashion and materials choices that will encourage domestic wool production to flourish while reducing our imprint on the environment. I have my fingers crossed for that all-American sweater company!
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1 person found this helpful