Regardless of how long I've been drawing or how many of my own techniques, I may have developed, I still from time to time find myself browsing through the instructional guides at the book store.

One of my more recent finds was "Drawing Realistic Faces" by Carrie Stuart Parks. Rarely has such a disaster come in
contact with my retina.
What? I found myself asking, could dear Mrs. Parks, angle possible be? Does she hope to sabotage aspiring artist, thereby eliminating future competition and prolonging her own career? After suffering through all 139 pages of this wood pulp based hell, I can only be left to wonder.

Certainly her unending drone of hack techniques and down home terms are still flitting about in my skull like a thousand angry bees.

"Why use a technical term? Lets call it a doohicky!.....why bother sharpening that pencil? Leave it blunt...after all, Its only human hair......human hair is supposed to look like straw....don't worry about drawing an iris...just make one big, flat pupil..."

..and really, why not? Why should we bother making faces look three dimensional? Why bother blending together your shading, to make it look real?

Why? Why bother? After all, with enough time and practice, even you, yes you, can be as incredibly mundane as Mrs. Parks!

Bottom line? Don't buy this puppy. Unless of course you have to much money on your hands and want to buy $24 dollars worth of kindling for your next marshmallow roast...but, then again why risk it? This lovely tome reeks so horribly, it might just make your food taste funny...