by Klára Marková
Published by Self Published on September 2017
Style: Contains Extras
Pages: 112
Format: Hard back
Enter a world of fairies, elves and magic where you can lose yourself completely in an enchanted place.
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Tenderful Enchantments Coloring Book Video Review
I hope you enjoyed the video review of Tenderful Enchantments coloring book with a comparison to the Czech edition, .
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Tenderful Enchantments Coloring Book  Review
Sometimes you fall in love and you just can’t rationalise it.  You can’t point to the one thing that justifies the feeling that you have, you just know that you are in love.  That’s the way I feel about Klara Markova’s coloring books.  I don’t know why I love them so much, I just do.  I also know that I have to have them, no matter the dent in my budget, because my heart would break without them.
When I got up and ordered Tenderful Enchantments in the middle of the night when it was first released, I hoped that it would be delivered to me faster than speeding light.  Sadly, I wasn’t one of the lucky ones blessed to get the book quickly. At one stage I wondered if it had been lost in the mail.  I had visions of a postal employee madly coloring my book during their lunch break 🙂 That’s one of the problems with International shipping, the postal service and customs can be unpredictable, especially in quarter 4 of the year.
When the object of your love is in transit it tends to make you anxious.  To calm my anxiety I checked for mail up to 10 times a day 🙂  The time I spent waiting for Tenderful Enchantments were anxious days where sometimes I felt a little teary.  I had hoped that all this worry would be worth it.  It’s funny how a coloring book that you haven’t even seen can do that to you.
Finally my Tenderful Enchantments arrived but I had ordered Nehyplne Carovnosti as well, from a different supplier.  Luckily, it was only a few days later that it arrived on my doorstep.
I was finally happy 🙂   It was worth the wait.   I did not think that Klara could top the beautiful Magical Delights that completely stole my heart, but she has.  She has injected more magic and sprinkled more fairy dust throughout Tenderful Enchantments than I ever thought possible.
It doesn’t matter to me that I am practically the last coloring book reviewer in the world to have Tenderful Enchantments Coloring Book, because I had actually decided not to review it at all, as everyone has already seen it. Everyone except me. I avoided all the reviews because I wanted to be surprised.    It was only some readers that specifically requested that I review it that changed my mind – thank you, you know who you are 🙂
One of the things that you may notice about this coloring book is the loving relationships between the cute animals and characters in the book.   These moments of tenderness and sweetness and love seem to be the underlying theme of the book.
Cover & Layout
The aqua hardback cover features colored printing featuring a cute little house emerging from a lotus flower.  Ladybugs are dotted throughout the scene.  The little fairy house emits a glow that is reflected forming a gradient look on the cover background.  The artwork and title are highlighted with gold foil.  Looking at the front cover may produce a feeling of longing in the most hardened colorist.
On the back cover, a gorgeous fairy is depicted with her own pint-sized fairy. Lotus flowers and Ladybugs adorn the picture with dashes of gold.   It is on the back cover that we can read the note from Klara. It clarifies for me why I love her work so much she states “enter into a magical world where nothing is impossible. …I drew everything with deep feelings, love and tenderness” .  Maybe that is what I feel when I look at her books, her energy but that sweet innocence from childhood when you did think that anything was possible.  Maybe if you immersed yourself in the pages long enough, you could actually wash away the years of jaded cynicism that you may develop, and rediscover that feeling.
Navy blue cloth binding forms a background for the beautiful gold foiling of the title and artist name on the spine.
Tenderful Enchantments Coloring Book measures 25cm x 21cm and is the same size as the previous book, Carovne Lahodnosti.
Ancillary Pages
The title page features a lovely elf playing the violin with title text. On the reverse, there is copyright information
At the end of the book, you will find a beautiful short story from Klara and thank you to the fairies and elves.  Of course, this is beautifully adorned with mice and an elf.
The last page contains the fairy doors that are a feature of Klara’s books.  The little doors can be colored and cut out and attached to the various fairy houses in the book.  It makes the pictures interactive and even more special having these little additions.  I don’t know if I could bear to cut the page though!   The page is not perforated but a lovely dotted cutting guide has been provided to ensure that you do not cut close to the spine and damage the binding.
Layout
Klara is the Queen of presentation and laying out a coloring book.   A lot of thought must go into how she positions and formats the book.  The bulk of the images are on single-sided pages. On the reverse, there is a decoration and space to write your name, date you colored the piece, and perhaps your feelings or mediums used.  There are a few different designs of decoration used throughout the book to adorn the reverse of the page. You can color these images as well.
Where there are double page scenes, the reverse of the page has only the decoration space so you can color with your choice of medium without risking the image on the other side.
The paper is off white and medium quality.  As images have not been printed on the reverse, you can use your choice of medium.  As always, I would pop a piece of paper behind to avoid indentations from pencils or any bleed-through from markers.
Coloring Book Images and Illustrations
Klara has remained true to the type and style of illustrations that she delighted us within Carovne Lahodnosti.  There are many elements that are evident in that book that have flowed to this one, keeping the continuity between the books.   Elves, toadstools and delightful fairy houses all feature in the new book.
In Tenderful Enchantments, Klara appears to have delivered a book where there is an emphasis not just on the surroundings but the emotional bond between cute critters and elves.  You will see elves embracing while sitting on a bench, the moments of tenderness between insects flying about, the sweetness of little mice curled up in bed and of, course, my favorite the two bunnies cuddling.  There also seems to be an interplay of the tenderness between different life forms, the mermaid and the frogs sharing the same environment, the cat that features throughout the book and his elf owner, the elf and seahorse, and the mermaid and jellyfish.   It’s these subtle relationships that really make this book adorable.
Line art is black and crisp with the bulk of the lines being medium with finer lines for texture.  Klara continues the style of adding texture with fine lines and tiny clustered dot points.
As always with Klara’s art, you will find a multitude of images to practice your skills with, scales for sea dragons and mermaids, ocean backgrounds, skin and hair, fur, and nature.   The interior scenes that adorn the book, will have you coloring metal, wood and a variety of crockery, and an array of sweets and fruit.
Colorists with a minor visual impairment should not have any difficulty seeing the line art to color.  Approximately three-quarters of the book may have too much detail on the page to color in one sitting and maybe something to do a bit at a time.  The other part of the book has larger, open-spaced images that may be easier to color in.
Detail Level
Bonus
In addition to the gorgeous coloring book, each book also includes a lovely bookmark.  The bookmark features fairy and mushroom houses on one side and ads for the books on the other.   I love the bookmark, because not only is it useful, but it is a small coloring piece. It’s the first thing that I color before I make my way over to the nameplate page and ease myself into this luxurious coloring book.
Where to buy Tenderful Enchantments Coloring Book or Nehyplne Carovnosti
| [easyazon_link identifier=”B0758J1575″ locale=”US” nw=”y” tag=”mygamingweb-20″]Amazon[/easyazon_link] | Artist | Bookstore (best within Czech) |
Happy coloring x
Lea
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