My Book is on Its Way!

I am so excited! My book, "Moon Dance" is finally off to my editor, Nancy Dill of QuiltWoman.com. I am still working on some of the diagrams and there is still a lot of fine tuning to do before we can get it off to the publisher in February, but at least I am one step closer. We will be introducing it to the public at Spring Market in Pittsburgh in early May.

This has been such an amazing experience. I have always loved writing and I am good at it. I also love designing quilt patterns and sharing them both retail and wholesale through quilt shows and quilt shops all over the country. But it never occurred to me until a member of one of my quilt guilds suggested it last winter, that I could actually write a book of quilt patterns!

The book is based on my best selling pattern "Moon Glow". (Please click on the June entries at right to see a sample of that design made by Patty Oakley of Batiks By Design.) Once I discovered how popular that pattern had become, I began experimenting with other designs that evolved out of the concept of using a center panel as the focus of a quilt. I thought about publishing a series of individual patterns, then decided on writing a book. Suddenly my design ideas just took off - multiplying like rabbits until I actually had to make myself stop or I would have so many designs no one would be able to even lift the book! (Maybe I will just have to write another one next year!)

With the help of many of my quilting buddies, we have been hard at work making sample quilts - we have more than twenty quilts already! Next step is professional photographs of each one. I can't wait to see them all in print! (And my quilting friends are all just as excited as I am.)

This leads me to a question: When you are consideriing purchasing a quilt book, what features are most important to you (assuming you have found a book with a subject that interests you)? What makes you choose one book over another?

Lots of color photographs? Detailed diagrams? Clear and well written instructions? Tone (is the book informal and friendly or more serious and focused?) Price?

What other features do you value or require when deciding whether or not to purchase a particular quilt related book? I would love some feedback from you. I want to make my book the book you choose!

Stay tuned for more information about this book and other new pattern designs as they come closer to completion.

Cary Flanagan
Something Sew Fine Quilt Design
somethingsewfine@comcast.net