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Rating: 
Summary: Difficult to Follow
Review: At first glance this book seems almost as simple as paint-by-number, but when trying to do the projects I found that the explanations were sketchy and the photographs didn't show every step. I'm not an absolute beginner with pastels but my attempts certainly didn't get anywhere near the projects shown, and I don't feel as thought I learned anything. It's nice to see what's possible, but it would be better to work with simpler projects that are explained in detail. I definitely don't recommend this book to anyone who is not already accomplished in oil painting if not pastels.
Rating: 
Summary: Good Beginner to Intermediate Pastel Book
Review: Beginner to Intermediate (and maybe even some advanced) pastelists will find this book useful for developing their own pastel painting skills. The book is divided into 3 major sections. 1 gives a brief history of pastels followed by explanations of the various types of pastels and surfaces. 2 is Learning from the Masters. 3 is Pastel Techniques.In the second section Learning from the Masters each chapter begins with an in-depth critique of various masters of the past and explains how many of their effects were achieved and why they are considered masterpieces. What is interesting is that most (though not all) of these masterpiece critiques are of oil paintings. The Master critiques focus on general concepts of what made this or that painting work. For example, in the first demonstration she critiques an atmospheric oil painting by J.M.W. Turner. After devoting a few pages to the Turner painting she then introduced a guest pastelist who demonstrated how they achieved a similar effect (in this example- atmospheric) with soft & hard pastels. I found the critiques of de la Tour and Degas particulary interesting. Each painting also shows color swatches of pastel colors recommended if you wanted to copy one of the historical paintings or the guest artist's demonstration. The swatches are given instead of particular brand names and colors since these will vary from manufacturer to manufacturer. Beside the color swatches will be a box listing the techniques the guest artist uses and the page number to the third section of the book that gives a detailed discussion of the technique. The critiques will have one page where the full painting is shown and an over-all discussion at the side. The next page will show the same painting on a smaller scale with a "points to watch" format with arrows pointing to particular areas of the painting that the author wants to emphasize. The third page will introduce the guest pastelist and show step-by-step how to achieve a similar goal with a pastel painting. The final section of the book focuses on the various techniques. Effects such as mixing colors, broken color, combining charcoal and pastel, corrections, creating details and edges, feathering, hatching and cross-hatching, line strokes, side strokes, underpainting and wetbrushing. Actually I only listed a few of the techniques described in this section. Over all this is a very good book if you are a beginning to intermediate pastelist. Even advanced pastelists might find it interesting since a large part of the book is devoted to critiquing and discussing master paintings. There are a wealth of photos demonstrating everything explained and an index in the back. The sole reason I gave this book 4 stars instead of 5 is that there is almost no discussion or serious consideration given to oil pastels. I have used oil pastels for several years and am always disappointed at the poor attention given to this delightful medium. For someone who wouldn't miss the lack of attention given to oil pastels then this book would probably rate a 5. Overall this is one of the better pastel books I've read and I refer to it constantly as I'm learning to paint with soft & hard pastels.
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