Japanese knitting books

Last June I stopped at a Japanese book store in NYC. There I found Vivian Hoxbor's Domino KNitting translated into Japanese. I had bought the English version a few years ago. Then had sold it for a few pennies on Ebay when I was going through a purge of knitting books I didn't think I'd ever use. Of course just a week later in a class at Knitters Day Out Janet Szabo pulled this amazing swatch that she said she knitted using a technique she said she found in Domino Knitting.

So now I own both versions: the English and the Japanese. It is interesting to see the differences in the books besides the obvious. The knitted samples in the English version are all very dark and sombre. Most of them tend toward autumn colorways. Not particularly appealing to me. Also the directions are mostly written with only a few diagrams. Some of the wording is very confusing.

The Japanese book has a lighter feel. The pages are not as crowded. The samples have a lighter palette. The diagrams are clearer. Even though I don't read Japanese at all I think I would have an easier time knitting a project from the Japanese book. If I were to recommend one over the other I'd say get the Japanese version.

The picture on the top is from the English version. The picture on the bottom is from the Japanese version. While I don't really care for the pom poms at the bottom of the Japanese shrug, I am far more inspired to knit the shrug (and maybe changing the pattern to a full sweater instead of a shrug) than the English ruana (which looks a little like a heavy wool blanket) .