Mark P. BlockTurquoise Mines, Minerals, and Wearable Art, 2nd Edition

The book is well written and has LOTS OF COLOR PHOTO'S. Most are contributed by a East Coast Dealer who is no longer in the business (according to the internet) Tons of bad PR if you look up his name....( fake jewelry, poor quality and over priced; etc) Not my judgment but yelp..... This is a book published by Schiffer Publishing and as usual it has a few editing problems,,,,and at least 2 of these are REPEAT PROBLEMS from other published works by them.... photo's upside down,,,wrong captions on photo's,,, etc. Just plain sloppy. Overall I enjoyed reading and looking at the pics. It gives you a "mouth watering view of what's out there,,, or what was out there . Just realize that FAKES are more FREQUENT NOW than ever,,, and BUYER BEWARE...... Know your dealer and research the maker ( check for other pieces made by him/her)

This is a large book, worth the money but haven’t gotten through it yet.

Exactly what I expected, condition was good.

Wonderfully illustrated

As a turquoise addict, I had to have this book. I am especially interested in telling different mines apart, and Chinese turquoise from American. This book did not help much with that. In fact I am more confused than ever! I have no idea why he has a map of the world on page 41,don't we all know what the world looks like??? Ditto for the New Mexico landscape photo on page 6 when most of the US turquoise comes from Nevada! Some of he turquoise types have a paragraph or so about them with lots of photos, some have a couple of sentences with NO photos at all. I suspect that not even the "experts" can, in most cases, tell one from the other, The photos show a bewilderingly huge variation within each mine. In fact the photos are about the only thing I can recommend about this book: lots and LOTS of good quality photos, although sometimes there are way too many photos crammed on a page while other items get a full page all to themselves. Apparently every single item of JR's Southwestern Trading Post are in here, along with a few others. At one point the author recommends scratching a turquoise with a nail to see what ??? hardness I guess. I doubt anyone is going to allow you to take a nail to their items. Issues of stabilized, treated, natural and fake turquoise are all dealt with in a very perfunctory manner. Basically you are supposed to "trust a reputable dealer".I guess it all boils down to "visual appeal' which was what I have been going by for years anyway.

A little disappointed as the book is filled mainly with photos—-there’s very little text. Also, the photos appear to be enhanced; color is unusually intense and not natural or normal looking.

Colourful and looks interesting