(Sarah Read is an author, editor, yarn artist, and pen/paper/ink addict. You can find more about her at her website and on Twitter. And check out her latest book, Out of Water, now available where books are sold!)
School is on the horizon--or has already started for some of you. And with that comes the best season for Pen Addicts--school shopping season, where an abundance of stationery flows from around every corner. If you are a student, or provide for students, it's time for that bountiful harvest of papers and pens. I have two semesters of school left, and two kids in school, which I consider permission to indulge.
My dislike for most spiral notebooks is well documented, which is one of the reasons that these Kokuyo Campus notebooks with the glue binding are some of my favorites. This pack of five notebooks has a pattern inspired by water drops, with each book a different color to make different volumes easy to find. They're very pretty--calming, with more flair than a standard plain cover.
The cover is thin cardstock and each book has 30 sheets of Kokuyo's 70gsm paper. Kokuyo's paper is very good. It doesn't feel like it's going to be fancy, but it holds up well. It impresses me every single time, and the sense of wonder never gets old. With non-liquid ink and fine pens I saw no hint of misbehavior, though there was some feathering on my test page when I used several kinds of very broad and wet nibs. There was no bleeding, though. Even the Sharpie struggled to bleed through. This is the first time I've had feathering with this paper, and I didn't see any in other spots, so I'll have to revisit my thoughts on this after more writing.
The paper format is excellent, with a space for the date on each page, and a dotted line layout, which is a wonderful compromise between grid and lined paper. The lines are present for even writing, and the dots make outlining look neat and organized. All the lines are faint enough, though, that you can choose your own adventure if needed. The lines are 6mm spaced, with dots every 5mm. This layout really works for me, and I wish it was more widely available.
The pack of five notebooks is listed at $19 on Jetpens, which is a great deal, since the individual B5 notebooks are $4.25. It's a fantastic price for paper this good. I'll make great use of these in my last few classes, with hope that the nice paper and pretty covers helps sooth my blooming senioritis.
(JetPens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)
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