Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

I know that it might seem a bit odd that I'm reviewing a pencil sharpener. You would think that pencil sharpeners are pretty straight-forward as far as functionality goes. Whether it's one of those cheap hand-held manual sharpeners or a high-end electric one, their basic function is to sharpen a pencil. Seems like a pretty easy concept to master, right? Well, for the past seven years I've had at least one child (now two) in elementary school where pencil sharpeners are a necessity. The public school itself doesn't provide wall-mounted sharpeners for children in the classrooms (apparently due to budget cuts) and require a pencil sharpener to be included in every child's backpack when the go to school. I don't have much of a problem with that, but I have learned rather quickly that pencil sharpeners that actually sharpen pencils decently are hard to find. So with that in mind I decided to give the Westcott iPoint Ball Pencil Sharpener a try. It works wonderfully. No matter what type of pencil I attempt to sharpen, it does a brilliant job. My wife always said that cheaper pencils always sharpen poorly, but the Westcott put that belief to rest. I literally grabbed dozens of freebie pencils that my family has acquired over the years from birthday parties, carnivals, restuarants, etc. and sharpened all of them. Every one of them came out with a nice tip. The only drawback on this sharpener is that you must secure it with one hand on a table and then secure the pencil tightly with the other. Lightly holding the pencil doesn't cut it. The ball itself will spin like crazy unless you put a hand on it. The sharpener requires four "AA" batteries that are not included. Reommended.