Book Review: Terry Pratchett’s Discworld Colouring Book Illustrated by Paul Kidby

Fans of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld series will probably know that Paul Kidby was the illustrator for the covers of the later Discworld books. Since 2002 he’s been the artist who’s done the covers and art in various books related to the series. The Terry Pratchett’s Discworld Colouring Book is full of line art versions of some of his art. In total there are 77 pages to colour in, 78 if you include the title page and 16 pages of the original full colour art for the line art versions in the book.

This colouring book has images from various stories, along with excerpts from the books themselves on a lot of the pages next to the full page images and surrounded by their own art too so you have the link to the Terry Pratchett works there too. It’s been around for a couple of years, it was first published in 2016, but somehow I’ve missed it. I think it came out just after I’d bought a few too many colouring books and was taking a break but it’s in my collection now.

Book Review: Red Nose Day Colouring Note Book

I realise that this year I haven’t actually done that well when it comes to actual book reviews, I will admit my first book of the year has proved a longer read than I expected. Today’s book review is kind of a mix of a notebook and a colouring book and has been sold in TK Maxx in partnership with Comic Relief with a portion of the money going towards the charity as with the rest of the range. This product donated £2 of the £5.99 to the charity.

This year’s Red Nose Day collection at TK Maxx is based around photographs by fashion photographer Rankin. They’re all photos if abimals, though they’re either dressed up or have a red nose added in afterwards. The majority are black and white with one in colour, which lends itself to a colouring in book as you can give them the traditional colours or go pop art and bright colours. These are all available exclusively at TK Maxx, though I think the books and other more home products are also available at Home Sense, their home and lifestyle stores, and is available online here or in stores.

Book Review – Escape to Christmas Past: A Colouring-book Adventure by Good Wives and Warriors

Title: Escape to Christmas Past: A Colouring-book Adventure

Author: Good Wives and Warriors

Year written: 2015

Publisher and year: Puffin Books, 2015

ISBN Number: 978-0-141-36676-0

Earlier this year I did a review of the Shakespeare’s World colouring book from this series, the Puffin Classics colouring books that are based on classic books or authors. This

Escape to Christmas Past uses themes and phrases from A Christmas Carol, a classic Christmas story, so it has a seasonal theme and seemed a good one for this time of year. This was actually the first of this series I saw and I loved the look of it.

As this is an adult colouring book the pictures are mainly made of smaller patterns and pictures within the scene so they’re small areas to colour and it’s pretty relaxing. As this one is so detailed I would say it’s more of a fine liner colouring book as the pencils I have got too blunt to fill in the finer details very quickly so you’d have to sharpen them very often. This series of colouring books in general is a lot smaller than the majority of adult colouring books so it’s a great one for travel if you like to colour on journeys or take it away with you, it’s small enough to fit into most larger handbags I think.

Amazon and Paperchase Recent Purchases: Getting Ready For Christmas

Happy late Thanksgiving to any of you guys who celebrate it and happy Black Friday/Black Tag shopping even for people who don’t. I managed to get a couple of bargains with some clothes I wanted anyway and a big order for goodies from Holland and Barrett (I’ll have so much dried fruit and snacks over Christmas we could get snowed in and we’d be fine!) Have you guys braved the stores or found any bargains online? Or just avoided the whole thing altogether?

 

I’m feeling rather Christmassy recently and I decided to do an order from Paperchase to get some decorations, I got a new tree last year that’s slightly bigger than the one I had for 12 years and finally gave up on me so I wanted some extra decorations. I also did a smallish order from Amazon, a couple of things I’ve wanted for ages and I might finally be getting organised for my Ciate advent calendar swatching this year, or nail varnishes in general, and getting some nail wheels that I’ve been meaning to get for nearly two years now.

There’s a few things in these orders that are sort of bought with the idea of using them for photographs for the blog so I’m hoping that I’ll finally have a definite backing and some decorations. It’s taken me two years, long enough right?

June and July Favourites: Two for One

I realised, when working out what to include in this post, that I didn’t actually do one of these for June so this is going to be a bit of a two months in one. Also, it turns out that most things work on the new Windows 10 but edge does not like WordPress and my camera is not registering on there so this post is coming from my iPad including photos so may not be the best quality

I don’t know how many of you are in the UK and how many will have watched Robot Wars when it was first on, or on any of the repeats, but I love that show. As the new series has just started a lot of June and July I was watching the original series to get ready and I was surprised at how early I was watching it originally, it seems I started at series 2 with the original airing. So far I’m liking the new series though I do miss the rhymes from Craig Charles in the later series. Also some of my favourites aren’t in the new one but it was to be expected, I wonder how the original robots would have survived against the new ones. 

Book Review: Escape to Shakespeare’s World – A Colouring-book Adventure by Good Wives and Warriors

Title: Escape to Shakespeare’s World: A Colouring-book Adventure

Author: Good Wives and Warriors

Year written: 2016

Publisher and year: Puffin Books, 2016

ISBN Number: 978-0-141-37121-4

It’s been a while since I did aa book review as I’ve not been reading much but I recently bought this colouring book and I really like it. Colouring has never been my favourite bit of art so I stayed away from the adult colouring book craze when it started, but after actually getting one and trying it I find it surprisingly relaxing.

This adult colouring book is based around the plays of Shakespeare, or some of them, the fact it’s only a small number might mean there could be more in the future though I don’t know. The Good Wives and Warriors illustrators are actually Becky Bolton and Louise Chappell and there’s also Alice in Wonderland and Charles Dickens themed books in the series. I really like this idea of having colouring books based on books or series that are already known.

Book Review: Harry Potter Magical Animals Colouring Book by Warner Brothers

Title: Harry Potter Magical Creatures Colouring Book

Author: Warner Brothers (I guess, there’s no author or illustrator given but I’ve included a photo of the names acknowledged in the back of the book)

Year written: 2016

Publisher and year: Studio Press, 2016

ISBN Number: 978-1-78370-582-5

Since starting with adult colouring I have found so many books that I wanted but held back from getting them as I’d have more than I could actually colour in. However, when I saw both of the Harry Potter colouring books I decided to get them as they combine two things I like. They were also half price at £4.99 on Amazon. One thing to note, which I didn’t realise until after I’d bought them, they aren’t sold as adult colouring books so most of the images are closer to those in traditional colouring books rather than being made of smaller areas and patterns within the big picture.

This is the second in the collection, I guess they’ll be making more given how popular these ones seem to be amongst others I know who enjoy colouring in, and is based around the magical creatures in the Harry Potter universe. As with the other Harry Potter colouring book there are colour pages at the back with a combination of movie stills and concept art, I think they’re all colour versions of designs within the book. There are 80 pages with lineart, including the introduction page which has a design around the words to colour in. There are 16 pages of colour at the end so overall there are more pages in here than quite a few of the colouring books I’ve seen online.

Book Review: Harry Potter Colouring Book

Title: Harry Potter Colouring Book

Author: Warner Brothers (I guess, there’s no author or illustrator given)

Year written: 2015

Publisher and year: Studio Press, 2015

ISBN Number: 978-1-78370-548-1

I’ve been wanting to increase my colouring book collection for a while. I saw the Harry Potter colouring books and as these combine two things I like; Harry Potter and colouring in, I decided to get them when they were on offer on Amazon. At the moment they’re £4.49 rather than the RRP of £9.99 and I think that’s the cheapest I have seen them anywhere in the UK though they’re also in offers on The Works website sometimes as well.

This is the first Harry potter colouring book and incudes pictures that are line drawings of scenes from the movies, some that are pictures of creatures and artefacts from the world and some are just repeating patterns of magical things. There’s also sixteen pages at the end that are printed in colour and includes the original screen shots, concept art or just colour versions of the designs in the book to give you some ideas or inspiration if you want to keep them true to the original colour schemes. The rest of the book is 102 pages including the introduction and front page inside that do include colouring elements but I’d say there are 100 pages, some of them double page images, to colour in. It seems like quite a large colouring book page wise compared to some of the others out there.

Recent Purchases: A Very Potter Amazon Order

It feels like I’m doing more of these recent purchases posts recently but next week I should be back to normal posting schedule, I seem to finally be getting over this cold thing. I did plan another post for tonight but then this arrived in the post and I was too excited to look at them so had to post this tonight. Almost everything in this order has been going in and out of my basket on Amazon over the past few months and all of them happened to be cheaper at the same time so I bought them. I hadn’t actually heard of the Illustrated Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone until a couple of weeks ago but I saw some photos on Instagram of an illustrated Harry Potter in amongst other Potter goodies so I had to look it up. I got everything in this post from Amazon.co.uk but they’re available in a lot of other places, I haven’t seen the Illustrated Harry Potter anywhere else but I haven’t really looked in book shops, I saw the price on here and just got it.

Book Review: Animal Kingdom by Millie Marotta

 

Title: Animal Kingdom a colouring book adventure

Author: Millie Marotta

Year written: 2014

Publisher and year: Batsford, 2014

ISBN Number: 9781849941679

I got this book for Christmas and have been colouring it in since so thought I’d do it as one of my book reviews. I wasn’t planning on reviewing many of my Christmas presents as it seems a bit odd sometimes to review something you’ve been given but as I know a lot of people like these colouring in books I thought I’d share what I think so far. When I first saw these adult colouring books I wasn’t sure if I’d like them since I’ve not been a fan of colouring but it’s surprisingly relaxing and fun when it’s these designs with smaller patterns inside a bigger image.

This books is by Millie Marotta who has a range of books out, I think they’re all based around animals and the natural world and they have a range of pictures and repeating patterns to colour in which have smaller designs inside them. This one is based on images of the animal kingdom, as the name suggests, and there’s a range of pictures from underwater and land animals. Some of them are full images like trees with birds or a page with leaves and insects and others have an animal in the middle with empty space around.