Whittling is the cheapest and easiest hobby you can imagine: with just a sharp knife, a little practice and the tiniest block of wood, you can make a characterful carving in less than an hour. It's relaxing, too, and the charming and quirky results offer a cute payoff in return for a very slight investment of either time or money. A warning, though: this simple hobby can prove addictive.
Steve Tomashek, whose masterly little figures have won a slew of awards in the US, guides the reader through the basics, showing you the first simple cuts (on root vegetables, to minimize the danger of accidents) to create first a turnip bear, then a carrot mouse. Confidence built, you can graduate to wood, and work through photographic steps, practising each technique with specific projects, and enjoying the increasingly polished results. You'll learn how to sand, paint and decorate your carvings and the final chapters teach you how to make jointed figures and how to undertake minute groups, from a Noah's Ark to a forest scene.
