Daily Archives: May 15, 2017

Mermaids in Wonderland: A Coloring and Puzzle-Solving Adventure for All Ages

By: Marcos Chin

Rating: 5 of 5

Mermaids in Wonderland is the second beautiful coloring book by Marcos Chin. There are many beautiful undersea designs with many mermaids. There is also fish and other sea creatures and plants. The designs are detailed and fun to color. While there are small areas to color, for the most part, I don’t consider the designs to be intricate and difficult to color.

As with Mr. Chin’s earlier coloring book, this one is divided into two parts. The first (and larger) part is white background and the second part is with black background. There are a lot (more than I prefer) puzzle solving opportunities on the pages. I wish that the artists would put the puzzle queries on a single page (with pointers to the pages involved) and leave the wording off the coloring page. That’s my personal preference but others may like the puzzles as-is.
The cover of this book is very pretty. It has copper metallic accents and some of the elements are touched with clue and green tones while others are left as black on white line drawings. The front and back cover fold out with coloring opportunities on the inside (white background at the front cover and black background at the back), however, the paper is slick. There are also four detachable (perforated) postcards printed on a good heavyweight card stock. The postcards are pre-set up for address and stamp areas.
In my coloring book, the alignment of the pages was quite good. The binding is sewn rather than glued, so you can remove several whole pages at a time without loss of design by snipping a few threads. I was able to get the book to lay flat by breaking the spine slightly by push down very hard to fully open the book.
This is what I found while coloring in this book and testing the paper with my coloring medium:
94 pages of Mermaid Designs with a considerable number of puzzle to solve
Printed on both sides of the page
Paper is heavyweight, white, slightly smooth and non-perforated
Sewn Binding
Many designs spread across two pages
Many designs merge into the binding area (especially two-page spreads)
Alcohol-based markers bleed through the page
Water-based markers can spot through and leave shadows on the back of the page. As with the prior book in this series, my worst experience was with Staedler triplus fineliners. The brush end of Tombow dual markers did not bleed through or leave shadows.
India Ink pens and gel pens do not bleed through or leave shadows. Gel pens take more time to dry than usual.
Colored pencils worked with with this paper. I tested both oil and wax based with good results. While the paper is lightly smooth, it still had enough tooth for good pigment, layering and blending.

Chibi Girls: A Cute Coloring Book with Adorable Kawaii Characters, Lovable Manga Animals, and Delightful Fantasy Scenes

By: Jade Summer

Rating: 5 of 5

This is my second Chibi Girls coloring book by Jade Summer (note that this is not a duplicate of the first one of the same title). There are 25 different designs (with 2 copies of each design for a total of 50 coloring pages.) The designs are cute fantasy girls are drawn in manga style with full backgrounds. The designs are quite detailed and some contain small areas to color. The designs; however, are not what I consider intricate and difficult to color.

The word chibi is a Japanese slang term for small person. The cuties in this book are small but have beautiful big eyes and lots of personality. The designs put the girls in many scenarios, including a ballerina, a witch, a steampunk girl, a Roman warrior, an Egyptian princess and much more.
While you can have access to .PDFs when you purchase this book, my review is based on the book as it is received from Amazon. That way you will know what the pages look like and how they accept color. I like that the publisher provides the digital version as well so you can choose the paper you wish to use and/or to color the pictures as many times as you choose.
This is what I found while coloring in this book and testing the paper with my coloring medium:
25 x 2 each fun Chibi girl designs for a total of 50 coloring pages
Designs are printed on one side of the page
Paper is typical of CreateSpace: white, thin, slightly rough and non-perforated. The back of the page is printed black.
The designs do not merge into the binding. There is a heavy framing line at the outer edges of the design to give the project a more finished look, especially for framing.
Glue Binding (there is room to cut the pages out if you choose to do so.)
Though you cannot see the bleed-through easily due to the back of the page being printed in black, I recommend the use of a blotter page when working in this book. I use a page of card stock or several sheets of heavyweight paper under my working page. It keeps seeping ink and marring dents from ruining the pages below.
Alcohol-based markers bleed through the page quickly.
Water-based markers bleed through in spots.
Gel pens and India ink pens leave shadows on back of the page. India ink can bleed through if you apply heavily or multiple coats.
Coloring Pencils work well with this paper. I found that I could layers the same color for deeper pigment or multiple colors and I could blend easily using a blending stick. I tested both oil and wax based pencils. I also found that hard lead pencils leave dents through the paper.