Leuchtturm lined slim softcover notebook

My good friend Stu, from Nero's Notes sent me a couple of notebooks recently. One was this little number; the other was from Poach My Lobster, and a review of that will be coming soon. Although these were a gift, these are my honest views on the notebook.

Stu knows my penchant for slightly differently sized books (see all my recent posts on B5 and B6 stuff). I find that A5 can be a little bit big for a handbag, but A6 is a bit too small for me. I've slowly been shifting towards B-sizes, using B5 for writing notebooks (see here, here, here and here), and looking at using B6 for a Traveller's Notebook (see here). So both of these notebooks were a brilliant size for me.

The Leuchtturm softcover slim notebook measures 125 mm x 190 mm (making it almost B6 size:125 mm * 176 mm). It would fit in my B6 TN cover, but it would be as tall as the cover (probably making the stringing a bit tight - I don't know, I've not tried it). But, I don't want this for my TN, I want it as a satellite notebook to keep in my handbag! The one I was sent is lined, but they are also available in dot grid or plain.

Leuchtturm B5 dot matrix book

Following on from converting an old Deskfax Filofax into a B5 TN and getting a great new B5 notebook for it (review here), I also took advantage of the fact that Bureau Direct were selling off their Leuchtturm B5 dot grid notebooks. I just looked at the Bureau Direct site and they were out of stock and I suspect they aren't going to get them back in. But... Amazon do sell them (though not at 20% off like the Bureau Direct ones were...). If the price of them on Amazon is a bit rich (it seems to be going up and down), then there are also ZenArt's Bullet Journal Notebooks available on Amazon (but I don't know what they are like as I've never bought one).

But... back to the ones I do have! Given that Bureau Direct said that they were discontinuing stocking them and because delivery is free over £20, I grabbed a couple - a raspberry pink (berry) coloured cover and a sea-green (emerald) coloured cover.

Front

Back

There are 121 numbered pages, a blank table of contents, 8 perforated (detachable) sheets, an expandable pocket, and a page marker. The pages are thread bound so the book opens flat and paper is cited as ink-proof and acid-free. I've found other Leuchtturm paper a bit iffy with fountain pen ink (see a review from a few years ago here) and I haven't yet tested these ones. I suspect I will find them a bit iffy too, but I'll use them nonetheless.

Dot spacing is 5mm and the dots are fairly unobtrusive. Although the notebooks are described as soft-cover, the cover is nonetheless pretty sturdy and certainly withstands being slotted into the slip pocket in the cover of my Deskfax TN.

These would probably make a great bullet journal. I wouldn't know... I've tried to bullet journal and it doesn't work with my brain. For me, these are notebooks to go in my renovated Deskfax-TN as writing books - books to plan out new novels etc. I did a post over on my author blog about my "writing Deskfax" - see here.

I tend to use slim notebooks when I'm starting out on a novel - when I'm just noodling around, trying to work out if the initial thoughts will ever grow enough legs to make it to a full book (sometimes they do; sometimes they don't, but I keep them all, just in case!). But once I genuinely think a book will emerge from all the noodling about, I need a decent sized book to write in. I'm looking forward to using these for that.

For bullet journallers out there, these may be the missing size between A5 being a smidgen too small, but A4 being a bit too big to be portable. Page size is good, but the overall thickness of the book is manageable if you have a decent sized bag (or use a briefcase). If I could get my brain to work with bullet journalling, I might contemplate using these with a week to view layout including enough space for tasks for each day (though I do already have a B5 diary that would do just that, by United Bees. I've not reviewed it yet, but it's available here if you want to check it out).

Since I went on a bit of notebook-buying splurge, I 'm hoping to have more blog posts coming soon.

Still to review:
Ya Jin Classic Lined Casebound Hardcover Notebook
Rosaliny Green World 4 Assorted Softcover B5 Composition Notebooks
Nero's Notes Leather Notebook
Nero's Notes 6 for £6

B5 books at Amazon:

What will I be using in 2017?

I've pretty much settled into a system now and so I'm all set up, ready to go for 2017. In this post, I'll tell you about the components of the system; in the next post, I'll show you how it all fits together.

The System:
One carry-around. This is my Meadowgate TN and it contains a week + notes diary, a monthly insert and a notebook
An A6 daily planner
A separate notebook with Goals to Projects to Next Actions.
An A5 day per page diary to write up my day in

Leuchtturm Bullet Journal - update

About 6 weeks ago, I got a Leuchtturm Bullet Journal from Bureau Direct (I blogged about it here). At the end, I said I'd give you an update "in about a week"... well, it's been a bit more than a week, but here's the update!

I'd love to say that I've embraced the bullet journal but I'm really struggling to fit it in with the rest of my system (which is not broken and therefore doesn't need fixing!). My current system uses a combination of three things:

• a week + notes diary (where the diary side holds the few appointments I have and notes page is used for the next actions I'm aiming to complete in the week, split into life areas)
• a note book for jotting stuff down while out and about
• an A6 squared notebook (by Clairefontaine) that is used for day planning. This has a page per day, and is the place where I time-box my day, list day tasks, plus it has space for jotting small things down

The first 2 of those are held in my Meadowgate Leather TN which is also my wallet (see here for details); the A6 sits open on my desk.

So, how am I using the A5 Leuchtturm bullet journal?

I was never going to use the first few pages as a 'future log' as all future log stuff can go straight into the correct date in the diary, so I used correction tape over the labels on those pages. So far I haven't used correction tape over the pre-filled entry in the index, and if I do use the index (which, technically, is a table of contents...) I will do.

What it's ended up being is a "book of stuff I've jotted down". I started out with a page for email reminders, then a page for blog post ideas, one for random jottings (lyrics from a song I heard so I could find it online), some marketing notes, notes about how a Facebook ad had done, a list of book finds (for my author blog - I do a book finds post once a month), notes for social media scheduling, and notes about book promotion sites.

It's just over six weeks since I started using it, and I've used 12 pages. One of those is a failed attempt at doing a weekly overview layout (to see if it would work better than my diary. It didn't.). I genuinely don't know what to use it for other than a day book. I started doing marketing notes in it but then decided that actually, I'd prefer to keep all the marketing notes together rather than them ending up distributed throughout the book, so I re-wrote all of them in a different notebook. The rest of my notes are what I would think of as 'day book' notes - and maybe that's where its use lies - somewhere to jot down stuff.

The kind of thing I would usually use
for a scrappy notebook!

I know that other people use them in the way bullet journals are intended to be used - to clear everything out of your head and put it all in one place. However, I don't think my brain works like that at all. I like diary stuff in a diary; I like to journal in my journal; I like to keep scrappy notes (that can be tossed after they've outlived their use) in a scrappy book; I like to keep project notes all together in a notebook dedicated to that project ... you see my problem. I really don't like things all jumbled up together. So, short of using it as a project notebook (which I don't want to do now that it's got all this other stuff in the front), the only thing left is to use it as a scrappy notebook for jotting throwaway things in.

My problem then, is that it's an expensive book for using as a scrappy notebook! I have a zillion other books that I could use for jotting things down that don't need keeping. Anything that does need keeping should have a proper 'home'. But because it's such a nice book (the paper is surprisingly fountain pen friendly - some show through, no feathering, no bleed through) I feel like I'm not doing it justice merely using it for a "book of stuff I've jotted down". It's falling between two camps for me. I will keep using it as a high-class day book but it does feel a bit too nice for that.

I received the notebook from Bureau Direct, but the opinions are entirely my own and unsolicited.

Leuchtturm Bullet Journal from Bureau Direct

I was delighted when Mishka from Bureau Direct emailed me to say that they had the Leuchtturm Bullet Journals back in stock and would I like to try one. Oh, and how was I for washi tape? I said I would be more than happy with anything she sent.
Well, this morning, a parcel arrived for me. I managed to restrain myself enough to take some pictures before ripping the bubble wrap off!

Still in bubble wrap!

And then took a couple of pictures before unwrapping it all completely...

Front cover plus washi

Back cover plus washi

Here's the washi in more detail:

Top to bottom: baby blue, pink, tape measure washi

Okay, but the main part of the parcel was the bullet journal. I was interested to see what was different from a standard Leuchtturm dotted A5 notebook that turned it into a specific Bullet Journal notebook.

On the inside cover is a key for symbols used in Bullet Journalling, including space to note your own versions:

Key on the inside cover

Following that, there is the usual Name and Contact page. As with all Leuchtturm notebooks, the pages are numbered and there is an index at the front. The index in the Bullet Journal notebook is a page longer (total of 4 pages) than in the standard version and has 26 lines per page (as does the standard version). There are 240 pages of dot grid (5mm spacing) c.f. 249 pages to write on in the standard version. In the Bullet Journal notebook, those other pages are taken up with notes on how to use a Bullet Journal which come after the dot grid pages. Whereas a standard Leuchtturm notebook has 2 ribbon markers, the Bullet Journal has 3. In a standard Leuchtturm notebook, the top of every page has space for the date; in the Bullet Journal the pages are unlabelled.

3 ribbon markers
Also note that the page has no pre-printed label to add the date

The index is pre-filled with two things: Future Log and the Instructions. The first 4 pages of the dot grid section are labelled at the top with 'Future Log'. I found this surprising as I thought the point of bullet-journalling was that you did what suited you, not necessarily what someone else did.

Index - pre-filled with 2 items

First 4 pages are pre-labelled Future Log

I'm not convinced that I will use the first 4 pages as a Future Log so this was a bit annoying (for me).

There are several pages of instructions/tips at the back. I won't show you all of them, but here are the first few (there are 8 in total):

Introduction

Rapid logging

More on rapid logging

Tips

Obviously, as it has only just arrived, I've not used it properly yet. I'll post again in a week or so to let you know how I'm getting on with it.

Bullet journalling update: A5 for long-term goals

Just before I went away on holiday, I was experimenting with two bullet journalling things:

1. long-term planning in an A5 Leuchtturm
2. day to day planning in an A6 Clairefontaine grid book

I took both of them away with me; the long-term planning to get filled in (since I thought the perfect time to stand back and think about long-term goals was when I was relaxed) and the A6 day to day, to note things about the holiday so that I could write my journal up when I came back (to save me taking it away with me). I'll show you what happened with the long-term planning version here and save the A6 for another post.

Long-term planning:
A while back, I won a turquoise A5 Leuchtturm notebook, a turquoise pen-holder and a pencil as a set from Bureau Direct, and this was the set I chose to use.
The first thing I did was to set up the first few pages for goals relating to my life-areas. I wanted to make the pages of the book a little bit prettier but I'm not very artistic, so I used pennant washi for headers and wrote the life-area on top of it. I put year plans on the LHS and quarterly plans on the RHS; one double spread for each life-area. I shall be referring back to these pages over the year. The only one not too personal to show you, is the house/garden one.

I then drew up a list of things to get done in the remainder of April, again using the pennant washi for the title of the page. The contents are too personal to share, but here's a picture of the washi!

I try to do monthly reviews, so the RHS will be for reviewing how the end of April went (and may continue over the next pages too). I used more washi, but some small hearts rather than the pennant, and labelled it 'review'

The list of stuff to be done is partly drawn from the life-area lists and also just a dump of things in my head that I think I should be doing, following my bullet-journalling system of a dot for a task (crossed through when accomplished). A dot converted to an arrow will mean the task has been carried forward and rewritten on the next month's list, but I'm showing you the set up before I do my monthly review.

This isn't 'pure' bullet journalling (if there even is such a thing), but my way of trying to keep track of the bigger picture. It's a list of goals and is essentially the 'goals to projects to next actions' of my planning system, relocated to a book. By breaking things down into life areas, I'm hoping it will help me to balance everything a bit better (and not just focus on writing, writing and a bit more writing...). I will (since I bought the pens...) use different coloured Staedtler Triplus fineliners for the different life areas, to give me a visual breakdown of the balance (but I only took a pencil away with me! May will be more colour-coded than April was...).

A more 'traditional' use of bullet journalling with a combination of tasks, notes, waiting on etc. is going on in the A6! More on that in the next post.

It's still a work in progress but has surely got to be better than no real system at all (which is how 2016 has been so far!). In time, I may move all of what's currently in the A5 and what's in the A6 into one book, but the A6 is working too well for me at the moment (in an 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' kind of way!).

What do people think? Hints and tips from anyone? Is anyone using a bullet journalling type system to deal with long-term plans? Let me know in the comments?

Bullet Journalling... the notebook

In my last post (you can read it here... it opens in a new window) I said that I was going to try out a modified form of bullet journalling as a way to try and keep track of long-term goals and plans. I finished the post saying I now just needed to choose a notebook for this.

It probably won't come as any great surprise to those who know me, that I've gone for an A5 Leuchtturm notebook. There are a number of reasons:

1. I have a few of them in the stationery emporium, waiting to be used
2. They have space for an index at the front, ready made
3. The pages are numbered already
4. There is a space for filling in the date on each page (though I may not always use it for that, but for indicating the topic instead)
5. They are fairly fountain pen friendly (though there is always some ghosting/show through)

I've not done much with it yet, as I am about to go on holiday (before the madness of the book launch starts...), other than label up the life-areas and fill in the index for the pages used so far. I'm going to take it away on holiday with me and fill in some of it there.

Pictures when I come back!

Review of Leuchtturm A4+ notebook

[Sorry for the absence of posts... who knew 'retiring' was going to be busier than being at work??]

Anyway, LONG overdue is this review of a Leuchtturm A4+ notebook. I've just started using it for writing more notes about the latest book and then realised I hadn't actually reviewed it!

Leuchtturm A4+ notebook

Exterior:
It's larger than A4, measuring 315mm x 225mm (page size = 313mm x 222mm; c.f. A4 = 297mm x 210mm) with a hard cover with leather-effect vinyl. There is a ribbon marker and a vertical elastic closure. There is no pen loop. According to the label, the paper is 100gsm.

Info on the label

Interior:
When you open it, there is space for your name and address. I never fill that in but tend to write what the contents of the notebooks are (e.g. notes on book x). Inevitably, that name/address page is stuck to the page behind, but as that's another sheet of plain paper, it's fine.

Then comes the table of contents. It's got 30 lines per page and 3 pages, so 90 spaces to list the contents of 233 sheets (or more than 2.5 pages per index line). Maybe that will work out for me, but given the enormous size of each page, I'm not sure it will. I would have liked to have seen 4 pages of index rather than 3.

Table of contents layout

Each of the pages in the main part of the book are numbered (1-233) and have a top margin, labelled Date, then a broader line space, then 32 lines, with a margin to the outer edge of the page. The sizes of all of these are in the figure below.

Page layout

detail of the page numbering

I like the prompt to write the date on each page. I'm terrible for forgetting to date things and then years later, looking at them and thinking, "I wonder when I wrote this?" The broader first line/space below the Date margin is handy for titling the page/section.

The side margin hasn't been used yet, but I know I will use it for flagging where notes continue, or where I might need to cross-reference.
The line spacing, at 8.5mm, is a bit broad for me, though it has worked well with the two 1.1mm stub nibbed pens I have. When I've shifted back to a regular medium nib, my writing has looked a bit swamped by the line spacing.

The paper is lovely and thick, and very smooth to write on. With most of my pens, there is no feathering, no bleed-through and no show-through. That said, a couple of my 1.1mm nibs have bled through to the other side, which considering the paper is 100gsm and allegedly 'ink-proof' was a bit disappointing. But, it was an especially wet ink/nib combo and there was no feathering or show-through. Less wet combinations have been absolutely fine. A good friend of mine had said that he'd experienced issues with the paper in that the lines on the page had been almost glossy and been quite ink-resistant with the pen skipping on them but I haven't found that, so maybe we've experienced different batches or they've changed the paper at some point.

The last 8 sheets (pages 219-233) are perforated so that you can remove them. The perforations are very fine and there would be no chance of the paper becoming loose if you didn't want to remove them.

The ribbon marker is okay, but is thin and light and gets a bit drowned by the size of the book. I'm tempted to thread a charm or bead on to it so that it doesn't wriggle back into the book so easily. The elastic closure is fine - firm enough to keep the book closed but no use for trying to trap a pen with. This is a book that stays on my desk though, where there is a glut of pens!

As described on the label, the book lies pretty flat. The pages tend to spring up a bit, but the spine does open to a full 180 degrees.

At the back is a pocket which will take A4 paper, though the gusseting does get in the way a bit. There is a sheet of labels - two lined (92mm x 72mm), two plain (92mm x 72mm) and three for the spine (187mm x 17mm). The sheet says "Please use these stickers for labelling the spine of your Leuchtturm 1917 book when you want to archive it" which feels a bit bossy to me! But that's just me! I tend to write on the spines with a silver pen because I think the stickers look tacky and might peel off.

Other than the usual embossed Leuchtturm1917 on the back, there is no other branding on the outside.

Overall:
I really like this book. The paper is fantastic and the acreage feels wonderful! It also makes me keep my desk a bit tidier, otherwise I can't open the book out! The line-spacing is a little wide for me but I do like the prompt on each page to date the notes. I'll reserve judgement on the index but I sense I will run out of lines in it before I've filled the book.

spanners

A few weeks ago, I thought I would use one of my (many) Leuchtturm A5 notebooks as a 2015 goal/project planner. There are enough pages in one to have 4 pages for every week, monthly planning pages and a few pages at the back for a year-review too. I would have set up the 249 pages as so:

Page 1: goals for the year
Page 2: Quarter 1 goals
Page 3: Quarter 2 goals
Page 4: Quarter 3 goals
Page 5: Quarter 4 goals
Pages 6-29: Two pages per month for notes/goals/lists/anything and everything
Pages 30-241: Four pages for every week (allowing for an extra week to overlap the end of 2014 and the start of 2016)
[The pages would be split into: notes for the week + Mon; Tue + Wed; Thu + Fri; Sat + Sun]
Pages 242-249: Review of the year

That, of course, was all before I hit burnout. Right now, I can’t even think what I will be doing in January, never mind the rest of 2015. Actually, I can’t even think what I will be doing tomorrow, never mind January!

Maybe I can just start to use a Leuchtturm A5 like this once I’m able to start contemplating planning again.

Does anyone else use a notebook for a home-made planner like this? If so, what do you use and how do you use it?

Stationery prize: World Cup bundle from Bureau Direct

A few weeks ago, I saw that Bureau Direct were running a competition to win a World Cup Stationery bundle and I entered it. I then thought nothing more about it (in fact I had actually forgotten all about it, as I was on holiday!). Then one day I was checking my emails and there was one from Dominic at Bureau Direct to say that I had won Spain 2010 in the Classic World Cup bundles. It was duly posted off to me and was there waiting for me when I arrived back from my holiday.

The bundle comprised:

• A medium lined Leuchtturm notebook in red
• A Leuchtturm pen loop in yellow
• A Lamy Logo ballpoint pen in blue

The Leuchturrm Notebook:
I assume the interior is identical to the interior of the berry red one I reviewed in May (read that review here) so I won’t review it again. The red of the cover is a nicer red than the equivalent Moleskine (which has a hint of orange to it) and the elastic closure is a darker red (which matches well).  The ribbon marker matches the cover well, but is lighter than the elastic closure. In many ways, it would have been nicer if the elastic and the ribbon had matched (even if they were slightly different from the cover), but then, I am ridiculously picky about things like that. I will certainly use the book for book-plotting!

The Leuchtturm pen loop in yellow:
I’ve had several of these pen-loops. I have a black one in my Leuchturrm Line a Day 5 year diary, another black one in my de Villiers slimline binder, a red one in the Moleskine diary (the diary I hated) and a pale blue one in another filofax. They are great – make sure you stick them in exactly the right place because the adhesive could hold an elephant up and you won’t be able to reposition it if you get it wrong!
My main gripes with them is that 1) there is always, always adhesive inside the elastic loop which then gets all over the pen you have in the loop and 2) the loop is really quite small – only a pen with a diameter of about <1cm will fit in it. The sticky adhesive inside the elastic eventually runs out but the one I had in my diary got glue on my biro for at least half the year. It rubs off okay (in a sticky sort of way) but it’s annoying that it does it.

The Lamy ballpoint biro:
I got a heap of despair from a good friend when I told him that the only pens I took on holiday with me were some bic crystal biros (I don’t trust my fountain pens to play nicely in bags). Anyway, the Lamy is lovely. It’s heavier than a bic crystal and has a very satisfying click to pop the ballpoint bit in and out. I haven’t written screeds with it yet, but it doesn’t (so far) seem to bleb anything like as badly as a bic crystal does, so maybe I will have to upgrade as the blebbing does annoy me!

The colour combination between the book, the pen-loop and the pen is delightful. Bright and summery!

All in all, this was a lovely little bundle to get! Thank you Bureau Direct!
[no affiliation, just a perpetually happy customer]

Review of the Leuchtturm 1917 notebooks

New Leuchtturm 1917 notebooks

I have SO many reviews owing. Let me begin to make amends and review the Leuchtturm 1917 for a start – I bought two of them in The Paperie’s 3 for 2 sale (the 3rd book was the Paper Thinks notebook, reviewed here). No affiliation - just a happy customer.

Overview:
The Leuchtturm notebooks are nicely designed books in my opinion. They have hardback covers (in a series of bright, cheery colours), with ivory/cream paper, numbered pages, a table of contents at the front, detachable pages at the back, an expandable pocket in the back, matching ribbon marker and a vertical elastic closure. The paper is lovely to write on. Notebook size is 208mm x 147mm. There are 249 numbered pages.

Detail:
The Cover:
I bought two – an emerald green cover and a berry red one. I have only opened the berry red (I assume that the innards of the emerald green one will not differ significantly!). The colours are vibrant and intense and a welcome cheer on a rainy May weekend up here in Scotland!

Back cover

The cover is PVU with a leather-effect and no plasticky smell, thankfully. There is no branding on the front or on the spine, and just ‘Leuchtturm1917’ embossed on the back. The cover is rigid.
As a comparison with other notebooks/my filofax, here is the emerald green next to a Sea Green Cartesio notebook...

Leuchtturm on the left, Sea Green Cartesio on the right

... and the berry red next to my pink Baroque filofax...

Inside:
The first page has a space for name and address. Personally, I would prefer just to have the lines and no instructions over what should go there, as I don’t put either my name or my address in most of my notebooks as they never leave my house.

Name/address page; booklet on the left

 There was a small card saying ‘thank you for buying this product’ inside and a leaflet about the notebook and the history of Leuchtturm. There was also a set of stickers for labelling the books (though personally, I have never used these and think they would detract from the exterior of the notebook. I might use one on the inside).

Stickers

After the name/address page is a blank fly-sheet, then there are three pages of index.

First index page

Then a double spread of them

This is followed by a blank side (the reverse of the last index page) then the main notebook.
At the top of every page is “Datum/Date:” and at the foot of every page on the outer corner, is the page number. I like this, as I always number my notebooks and I always produce a list of contents at the start of the book, so for me, this detailing is a bonus. I’m not so convinced about having the date at the top of every page – that might grow on me!

The paper is ivory/cream, with a line-spacing of 6mm. The lining is feint (very light, actually – I like how subtle it is!). The lines go edge to edge of the paper and there is a top margin of 12mm and a bottom margin of 7mm. The outer corners are rounded.

The last few pages of the notebook are perforated so you can remove them (I removed the last page to test how easy this is and also to do the fountain pen tests). Initially, the idea of the last few pages being removable hadn’t appealed, but in fact, these are very subtly perforated so it isn’t obvious that they are, nor would it be easy to accidentally remove them, so if you didn’t want to take out sheets, the book would stay intact. The perforations are incredibly fine and the paper came out okay (though it was a bit of a tug to get it started).

The back, expandable pocket covers the entire back cover and is pretty gusseted – you could cram a lot in here if you wanted to spoil the look of your notebook!!

Pocket in the back. (the white thing on the RHS is the book label)

The ribbon marker is a good match to the cover and to the elastic closure (yes, we all know how picky I am about these things!). It is a relief that this all matches so well on a notebook whose strap-line is “Details make all the difference”!

I personally prefer a horizontal elastic closure so that I can tuck a pen in to it, but if you wanted to carry a pen, Leuchtturm do matching adhesive pen-holders and you could stick one to the cover very easily.

Fountain Pen Tests:
Again, I don’t have as many inked up as normal. I used three italic-nibbed pens (by far my favourite pens to use) plus one standard nib plus a couple of Pilot V5 pens.
The paper was a little bit ‘grabby’ on the italic pens and made them feel a little scratchy, but the non-italic nib flowed smoothly over the page and it was a dream to write on with it. The two Pilot pens were okay (but not my favourite to write with anyway). There was no feathering and ink dried quickly, so lefties would be absolutely fine (assuming my inks are representative).

Crisp - no feathering

Bleed-through:
Hmm. A little disappointing considering they go on about ‘ink-proof’ paper. I could read everything on the other side of the page very easily. I’m not sure if I would want to use fountain pen in the books as a consequence. Maybe. I was expecting better though.

This is looking better than the reality...

Overall:
Gorgeous colour cover and well thought out interior. Good little notebook and one I am sure that I will use for book-plotting/writing. It’s just a shame that there was so much bleed-through with my fountain pens and that the page is a bit grabby on italic nibs.

I would award it **** (out of 5)