July 13,2006
My Dad, wrote this book as a labor of the love and devotion of his talent to share with the world. He is considered by professionals and hobbyists as the greatest master of his craft.
He has been cited in articles all over the world and recently we were sent an article from a major Fla. newspaper concerning a model ship builder. The article made reference to my Dad's book as being the "Bible" of model ship building. It made my modest but gravely ill father smile. I hope you have all enjoyed his book and will continue to for years to come. He is now living in Virginia Beach, VA.
I would like to give a heartfelt thank you to all his fans and most importantly my father, who has influenced many in this wonderful art. He has been my guiding light throughout my art career. Goodbye Dad. You will always be my shining star.
Stephanie Mastini.
Epilogue:
My father, Frank Mastini, passed away at home, peacefully in his sleep on July 15th, 2006.
He fought a courageous battle to the very end, sitting 4 feet away from his gift to all of our family to enjoy. The "Amerigo Vespucci". I know that is the way he wanted to be remembered. At his beloved home, surrounded by his life long passions and his loving wife, Lucy.
His last wish was that in honor of him, that contributions be made to the Boy Scouts of America.
He can now breathe again and smell the sweet roses he loved so much. I love you Dad.

Stephanie

I found this book to be a good primer on model ship building and worth reading for the novice builder such as myself but its a little disorganized and has some mileading steps in applying planks to the bulkhead or frame of the ship, they just seemed to be short cuts or cheats on doing it right. But all in all a good read and recomend it to any virgin ship buider! I found Ship modeling from stem to stern by Milton Roth more up to speed for me as i am 44 and have a lot of experiance working with wood. There is a vast amount of imformation out there for the model ship builder which is a blessing to us all. Ship Modeling Simplified was the first book i purchased on this vast subject and i can say i was not disappointed it is a great first read!

I seldom write critics, but this time, I just want to say, thank you to the author, it makes me clear about what ship model building is. I wish I have bought this book before starting the hobby, so won't have been so frustrated!

I would consider this book the Bible of model shipbuilding.
There is none better

The book is easy to read and has lots of illustrations.
Good read for beginners. (Someone REALLY new to the hobby.)

But, the methods described is not correct to the way real ships were built.
Since how accurately a modeler wants to model his/her ship is a matter of opinion, this book might suite the modeler.

For example: planking.
The book describes how to taper a plank to a sharp point to fit all slots.
This was/is NOT the way real ships are built.
On the other hand, I've already built two ships this way before I learned the proper way to plank and the model ships still look very good.

Wooden Model ship building is a hobby with vast depth and is very confusing for beginners.
Reference material for this hobby is just as confusing and vast.

But their are better beginner books out their with proper methods.
Example: "How to build first-rate ship models from kits"

For some reason I remember seeing very poor rating for this book. Maybe because it has lots of endorsement for a particular model maker?

But still, I felt it was the best book for a beginner. The fact that you can get it free with a kit from a retailer makes the decision easy to handle.

If you buy this book (Ship Modeling Simplified), just remember that the methods described in the book are all suspect.
I wan't very happy that I learned the incorrect method of building model ships from this book and had to re-learn the correct way.