25 Christmas inspired mouse and mouse house designs – printed one side of page

Nice Little Town Christmas 2

By: Tatiana Bogema (Stolova)

Rating: 5 of 5

This is the second in a series of special Christmas Nice Little Town coloring books. In this book, the artist has chosen to spotlight her little mouse characters. The designs are certainly secular rather than religious in nature. The town is decorated from stem to stern for Christmas with trees, gifts, elves and more.

One of my favorites is of the little mouse sitting on Santa’s lap. The little guy is bawling just like my kids did the first time they went to see Santa. The mice are trying to behave themselves so Santa won’t bring them coal! The designs are detailed and some include intricate areas to color.

As usual with this series, each page is cuter than the one before.In addition to the Little Town drawings, the artist has also included some bonus illustrations of Christmas ornaments. The ornaments are less detailed than the Little Town designs.

I want to note that the Amazon owned company, CreateSpace is now being folded into KDF (Kindle Direct Publishing.) These independent artist books will move along into the new group shortly if they have not already done so by now. According to what I’ve read, the same warehouses and printing presses will be used. No mention is made of paper but one assumes that it will be the same as well.

I don’t know if the copy I received was printed by CreateSpace or by KDP, but I can say that it is the same paper I am used to receiving (for years now) from CreateSpace. That is: thin, white, slightly rough, and non-perforated. I will continue to check books as I receive them and will note, in new reviews, if the quality changes.

This is what I found in this coloring book:

25 mouse and mouse house designs in the book plus bonus designs.

Printed one side of the page

Paper is typical inexpensive quality by KDP/CreateSpace printing: white with black on the reverse side, thin, slightly rough and non-perforated.

The designs do not merge into the binding.

Glue Binding

KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing – formerly CreateSpace) Paper/Media Quality

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.

Even though the black on the reverse side of the page “covers” the bleed through” of various media, it does still bleed through. So, protect your work and your coloring book. I like to use a blotter when working in this type of 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.

Coloring Pencils work fairly well with this publisher’s paper provided you don’t press extremely hard while coloring. I find that I can layers the same color for deeper pigment or multiple colors and blended easily with a pencil style blending stick. This is true of both oil and wax based pencils. I have also found that hard lead pencils leave dents through the paper.

Here are a few sample photos from the book: