The Night Voyage by Daria Song

15/10/2016

Summary
Current Price: £6.99
Number of Pages: 80
Size: 25 x 25cm
Paper colour: White
Paper surface: Smooth
Paper thickness: Good
Linework: Fine
Perforated: No
One sided: No
Binding: Glue
Drawings go into the spine: Yes
Waterbased pen bleed: Some shadowing

Daria Song is my favourite illustrator, hands down. Her work is so beautiful, delicate and charming that sometimes I'd rather it stayed monochrome, just so that you can appreciate the drawings in their original form. Daria's art is unquestionably amazing but can also be quite daunting to colour due to the high level of detail on each page.

The Night Voyage (released in Korea as The Present) is Daria's third in the 'Time' series of colouring books, following on from the storybook style of its predecessors. That same little girl from The Time Garden and The Time Chamber features throughout The Night Voyage, this time delivering toys to all the children in the world with the help of her Toy Conductor, who has magically come alive. You are taken on a journey where enchanted paper cranes drop gifts down chimneys like a stork would deliver a baby; hot air balloon flights, their baskets filled with presents; incredible cityscapes seen from above as the girl and her bewitched cohorts swoop overhead; and finally, a well earned rest for the child who generously shared her birthday gifts with the world. Join the adventure and have a look through the book below:

The book is the same size, shape and format as the previous books, and features a powder blue removable dust jacket that is accented with gold foil details. The paper is a crisp white stock that is thick enough not to allow bleed through from waterbased pens- but there may be some shadowing if going over the same area several times or using a particularly wet media. The double page spreads can be a little awkward to colour in the spine area which is the only real letdown of this book. It would be perfect with luxury layflat binding to match the quality of the illustration.

At the rear of the book there is a foldable greetings card for you to colour, cut out and gift to someone as the little girl did. I think this is a lovely touch and provides an extra special 'present' to the colourist.

As I touched on at the beginning of this review, Daria's art is quite challenging for any colourist including myself: despite them being among my favourite books I have barely coloured anything from the series as I don't always feel I can do them justice! However, when coloured fully these books will make an amazing keepsake for the children in your family to grow up with, turning the pages together and experiencing a story without words.

Here is my finished spread from the book, coloured with DoCrafts Artiste pens and PanPastels.