Review on Elegant Black Leather Journal With Pen Loop And Premium Thick Paper - Ruled, 8.4 X 5.7 Inches Notebook For Writing And Note-Taking by Amber Byrd

Cover The cover is some sort of synthetic leather, but it seems very durable. I am impressed by it. It is thick and has some back leather grain pressed into it. I like the feel of the cover, and I am confident that this book will hold up to some abuse. The book looks professional and I have no issues caring it around with me.Construction The journal has all the same stuff as other book-bound A5 journals in this category. It includes a page marker, elastic closure, and back pocket. They also include some cheap archival stickers in several different colors. The journal comes with an attached pen loop. That is awesome! I generally have to buy elastic pen loops and attach them to my journals and those pen loops seem to always perform poorly. This pen loop is stout and it does not get in the way at all. That is a major plus for me.Ruling Here is where things get interesting. I bough this book for the ruling. Some people classify this book as wide ruled. The ruling isn’t exactly wide, but it is a tad bit wider than other books in this class. Typically, dotted bullet journals (which seem to be all the rage right now) have a dot spacing of 5mm. I hate this with a passion! I write small, but I have a very hard time getting my penmanship constrained into such a tiny space. Ordinary ruled books in this category typically have a line spacing of 6mm. This is why I am such a fan of fine pens! Six millimeters is pretty narrow, but most of my books are in 6mm. I am generally happy with that. However, some of my pens have a nib that is a bit broader than my others. As such, it is difficult to enjoy writing in the 6mm lines with the broader pens. I purchased this book because it was marketed as a "wide ruled” journal. I measured the line spacing myself. Based on my measurements, the line spacing is 7mm. That may not seem like much of a difference, but that one extra millimeter makes all the difference to my penmanship with my broader pens. That is why this book is Winslow Approved. I needed a cheap book with a little extra room so that I could enjoy some of my larger pens, and this book did that for me. Excellent!Paper Quality This is the most important consideration for fountain pen users! This paper is smooth and it is thick, but it will not hold up to most fountain pen inks well. The paper is 120 gsm, so it is very thick. The paper is also smooth, and I enjoy writing with it. However, the paper is not ink resistant at all! The paper is very absorbent. I tested it with a bunch of the pens that I had inked up at the time. Based on my testing, I noticed feathering and spreading in inks that normally perform pretty well in other journals. The paper is so thick that ghosting or bleed through is not really an issue unless you are flexing or writing with a very wet pen. If you are using pencil or a ball-point pen in this book, you should have no problems. If you plan on using this book with a fountain pen, you should think long and hard about it. You may not like the results that you will get with this inexpensive and highly absorbent paper. The only one of my inks that performed well on this paper is Noodler’s Black.