Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I was very disappointed when this book arrived. I had assumed, based on the cover, that it would include plans and techniques for building working wooden clocks. By and large it does not. This is very specifically a book for scroll saw enthusiasts. What this means is that most of the book consists of patterns to cut out of sheets of wood into which existing self-contained clock mechanisms are inserted. The wooden mechanical clock on the cover is not at all representative of the contents. In fairness, there is one project with plans for building the depicted wooden clock, and it makes for an interesting ten or twelve pages. However, even this is a disappointment; the plans are by and large not dimensioned, simply being templates to be photocopied. I can understand this for some of the more complicated parts, but surely it wouldn't hurt to tell us how long each of the (numerous) axles are? Some of the construction of the body of the clock also seems suspect, with key joints being only supported by glue instead of using any real joinery. If you are looking for a book of scroll saw patterns, this might be a good one; I don't know, as I'm not really interested in that. If you want to make wooden clockwork as depicted on the cover, be aware that you will be paying for only a dozen or so pages of fairly unimpressive information. There are probably better sources of the information you want.