The Scourge of Upside Down Knitting Needles: 2024 Edition

It only comes but once a year and when it does it brings good cheer! And a lotta yelling. Big time yelling.

Yes! Today, you lucky devils, I am once again returning to everyone’s favorite series: The Scourge of Upside Down Knitting Needles.

The rules are clear. Knitting needles, as we all should know by now, historically have been portrayed in books for kids with their ends up, like TV antennae. And while there are apparently some obscure parts of Scotland where ancient grandmothers ascribe to this technique, it is wrong. Wholly wrong. Totally wrong. It fills my soul with its wrongness. As such, I have made it my life’s mission to be as petty as possible and point out which children’s books get the knitting needles right, and which ones get it wrong.

Now I’ve done this post, or a variation on it, in 2023 and 2022 and I’m 90% I must have done it in 2021 or some time before. What makes 2024 interesting is that I have found far fewer incorrect cases of knitting needle absurdity. People are learning. And growing.

But I’m still gonna call them out.

Please note that I am sure that I’ve missed some of the knitting in books of 2024. My apologies. Also know that just because an illustrator has failed to grasp the basics of knitting illustration, that does not mean that their book is bad. I’m not mad, people. I’m just disappointed.

Let’s get to it then! Here are all the books published in 2024 that I could find that depicted knitting.

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Full credit, right off the bat, to Ms. Yingling for spotting these little cuties. First and foremost, the knitting needles? Most certainly down. So well done there, Eliza Wheeler. But then there was some debate as to whether or not the second fuzzy face sitting here was actually knitting or crocheting. One commenter (this debate happened on Instagram) said, “They are both knitting. The polka dot friend’s second needle is there. You can see the yarn stopper of the needle under her green scarf.” So there you go. This one passes the test.

Eggs who stress knit. I’ll buy it. I bet a lot of us are stress-knitting these days. And look at those knitting needles! The ends are nicely down and it appears that Daisy Wynter knows the rudimentary mechanics of how knitting works. Well done, Egg Incident. Well done.

Ah, this sweet little book. Now as you will learn, the more cartoony an artist’s work, the more inclined they become to do knitting needles incorrectly. Such is not the case with Marianne Dubuc, however. She may not be doing a deep dive into details, but the needles are still on point.

In 2022 I made the unforgivable error of failing to include Tao Nyeu’s The Legend of Iron Purl in my knitting needle round-up. That book was, remarkably, entirely dedicated to heroic knitting and I just forgot about it. Not this year! Nyeu is still marvelous at everything she does, and this latest has, as you can see, a moose knitting on the cover. The needles are correctly positioned. I always love it when hooved animals in books knit. The logistics of it make zero sense, but who cares? Internal logic prevails!

This is where my expertise hits a wall. From what I can tell, this image of Tituba, shows her knitting on what appears to be double pointed needles in the round. Is that what it looks like to you? I’m a little curious about where all this blue wool is coming from in early America, and I’m equally baffled by what Tituba’s hands are doing here. So we’re giving this one a neutral score. It’s unclear to the casual reader, but artist Brad Holland is definitely putting some kind of effort in here.

Ach! This one breaks my heart. Market Day, if you haven’t read it already, is one of the finest easy reader books out this year. Yet here we have a sheep who is doing what you know I hate most: pointing the ends of those needles to the sky and beyond. I don’t care if you have hooves instead of hands, baby. Ain’t nobody, nowhere knitting this way.

Rhode? You’re killing me, man. Killing. Me. What’s with abuela here holding her knitting needles like that? And it’s not just a one-time thing, either. Rhode appears to double down and show image after image after image of the same wrong technique. Cute book. Terrible knitting.

Mavis arrives as a kind of palette cleanser. Clearly she knows what she’s doing. And we get to admire her from a whole host of different angles. You can practically count her stitches, it’s just that good. See? Cartoony AND accurate. It can be done.

Hmmm. Hard call. Tell you what, I’m feeling generous today. Let’s say that Ms. Rubio is at least on the right path. Those ends are a little high but you get the feeling that Badger will lower them presently.

Ah ha! You don’t expect to find images of knitting in informational picture books all that often, do you? Well, considering that this is a work of nonfiction, you can better HOPE that all the knitting portrayed inside of it is accurate. And, happily, in this case at least, it is.

On the one hand I’m not sure what this technique could even be called. On the other, I love that Mimi has her own knitting bag full of yarn that she takes around with her.

Naturally the person who brought us the Caldecott Honor winning Leave Me Alone (which featured some VERY accurate needlework) wouldn’t be afraid to put knitting in a graphic novel. This kind of reminded me of the knitting in Hereville: How Mirka Got her Sword. Less trolls, tho.

Okay, this woman looks a little out-to-sea when it comes to her knitting situation but I can’t fault that needle placement. It’s that other woman on the spinning wheel that has me more worried. I see the flax on the distaff now . . . how would you spin that? Don’t worry folks. We’ll include some more spinning wheels at the end of this post.

I’m not allowing myself to pick favorites… but if I had one, it would be this book. Chiaki Okada has done a heroic amount of work, rendering this book accurately. It’s not just the active knitting. Look at those endpapers, where every single stitch is evident! It’s Jan Brett worthy, it is. Marvelous.

Why yes. When invited to my neighbor’s son’s birthday party, I always bring my knitting. If that’s an afghan, it’s a HECK of a thing!

Hmm. Sketchy but there’s stuff here we can work with. Those hands are just gripping those needles so hard, you worry he may accidentally break them. But at least he’s holding the needles correctly!

Back in 2021 the world focused, during the Olympic competitions, on Tom Daley. The man knits, and he knits well. So much so that they put him into a book. So why the heck isn’t he smiling? He looks like someone’s going to hurt him after he’s done.

The very day that this post came out a co-worker introduced me to the wonderful weirdness that is Bog Myrtle. I realized that not only is it one of the loveliest twisted tales of the year, the knitting in it is exemplary. Now, admittedly, if you’re knitting a sweater I’m pretty sure you don’t start with the arm and work your way, ah, westward, but at least the knitting needles (which I believe are sticks in the book) hold true.

And now we come to an utterly unique situation. A case where someone sent me the illustrations to a book a full five months before its publication just to show me… incorrect knitting needle placement!

Sorta.

I shall direct your attention to The Knitting Witch by Norma Kassirer, illustrated by Mark Richardson.

But what’s this? What am I even talking about? Why this cover clearly shows CORRECT knitting needles. What can possible be wrong then? So this is an interesting case where a book is being released by its author’s daughter. Susan Kassirer (editor of A Long Walk to Water, amongst other things) discovered her mother’s manuscript when packing up her mother’s writing room. Norma Kassirer wrote Magic Elizabeth back in the day, you see. So delighted was Susan with this manuscript that it was promptly picked up by Simon & Schuster and came out this past September.

Now this cover looks entirely on the up-and-up but if you dip inside to the title page…

. . .

What the heck? And here’s the kicker of it all. Artist Mark Richardson? Unrepentant! What cheek! What gall! He defends his choice with what can only be described as pure unmitigated delight. When informed of my almost certain disapproval, he had this to say to Susan:

“She may, at first glance, deem KW with high favor, seeing as how I pretty much got the needles ‘correct’ on the cover. That’s because the Witch is bending forward and that pose affords such accuracy … but those rosy assumptions will soon turn a ghastly green as soon as she gets to the frontispiece with its Witch in full profile, impishly grinning as she wields those vile appurtenances skyward in what I now know (from BB’s blog) is ‘antennae’ mode. Of course, they are! That’s how the Witch dials in the magic from the ether and into the yarn as it knits itself. 

It’s either that–or the Witch is pulling a fast one by luring unsuspecting knitting enthusiasts in by the deceptive advertising on the cover so she can really bedevil them once inside with her Truly Horrid Technique (for as we know- good technique is bad technique to this Witch…cackling with glee).”

And so, we have a one-of-a-kind moment on our hands. This is not an illustrator unaware the state of knitting needles in art. This is an illustrator FULLY aware of what he is doing and thumbing his nose at tradition. And doggone it… I kind of have to respect that. I mean, anyone who can come up with a witch that, “dials in the magic from the ether and into the yarn as it knits itself,” is someone I can get behind. Plus he used the term “vile appurtenances” and now I need to try to work that into a sentence someday.

You win this round, Mark Richardson!!!

Let’s round this all out with some spinning wheel nonsense, shall we?

Is this an ancient walking wheel? It doesn’t appear to be a Charka wheel either. I see no distaff or bobbins or even pedals. What the what… ?

What?!? Nope. Sorry Rumplestiltskin, but whatever it is you’re doing right now it is NOT spinning straw into gold. Are there two distaffs here on one machine?

Bafflement upon bafflement.

Did I miss knitting-related books today? Feel free to NARC on them if you like. I’ll never give you away.

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