Listed below are my favorite coloring books SO FAR! These are the ones that I always come back to if I really am in the mood to color something fabulous.
These are MY favorite books so your results may vary.
Hanna Karlzon Coloring Books Dagdrömmar (Daydreams)
I probably have more pictures colored in this book than any other. There’s just something really magical about Maria Trolle’s drawings and they are easy to figure out. The paper is SPECTACULAR! If you are familiar with Hanna Karlzon’s books, this paper is the same Swedish type including the bookbinding. I purchased the Swedish edition from the Pen store, but the same publisher that recreated Hanan’s books are also working with Maria Trolle so I’m sure they are going to be just fabulous. I promise you will want this one for your collection. My video flip-thru
All four of the Good Wives & Warriors small-sized coloring books are my go-to for on-the-go coloring because of the compact size or just when I want to complete a page in an evening of TV “watching” and coloring.
Of course, returning to Secret Garden is always a bit magical because like for many of you, it was the gateway drug to my coloring book addiction. It holds the very first adult colorings that now look quite childish to me by my new jaded standards but then again it’s great to see how much my style has changed in the last year. This book is a bit of history and whimsey for those of us who started with Johanna as our coloring queen. Enchanted Forest is a close runner-up!
This one is very special for me because I discovered it while I was on a girl’s weekend with my two favorite people on the planet, my two grown daughters. It’s really a gorgeous book with artist-quality paper. You can order on Amazon Floribunda US ~ UK ~ Canada and Book Depository
Leila Duly has a new book for 2017 that looks gorgeous too. Done more in the Hanna Karlzon fashion as a 2-sided bound book. I can’t wait to see a copy. It’s called “The Flower Year“
Favorite Coloring Books that are harder to find
The adult coloring book craze started in Europe with Scottish illustrator Johanna’s Secret Garden, so some of my favorite books aren’t available in the US or on Amazon! I see them by following some fabulous colorists like Morena Vajak on Instagram. She’s always posting colorings from books that I desperately NEED to have.
This book still isn’t available on US Amazon so I checked eBay, Etsy and finally located it on the wonderful free shipping book site Book Depository. You would never know how fabulous this book is by looking at this listing BUT I saw images from it on InstagramThis is my first coloring from the book. It’s that really cool grayscale that makes it look like you are a fabulous artist. I love that!
I received this GORGEOUS book from the author and have a flip thru on my social media channels. you can also see colorings from this little gem on Instagram here. The book ships direct to you from the Czech Republic via her Etsy profile here.
Klára’s book reminds me quite a lot of the Swedish books from Hanna Karlzon and Maria Trolle that you know I love. If Amazon let me give it a 10-star review I would.
This coloring book is perfection! It’s a real hardcover book that can sit on your bookshelf for years to be shared with your friends and family. I have recently thought what a wonderful keepsake this will be for my kids and grandkids to see gramma’s books she colored in all those years ago. The paperback books will likely be tossed but not one like this. The pictures are fanciful and fun with just enough detail to make them interesting but not too much so that you are frustrated. The paper is luscious and toothy for we pencil addicts out there and printed on one side of the paper for you marker lovers. On the facing page, there is a little motive with an area for your name and a note. I’ve decided to put the date and the materials used to color it in. Thank you SO much for sending me this delightful book. I love it and it’s on my list of favorite coveted coloring books.
While I adored her artwork, the CreateSpace paper on Amazon just didn’t do it justice. I was thrilled to discover that she sells her books along with a ton of her art in both digital download formats as well as all of her coloring books on beautiful thick paper on Etsy. I immediately ordered both and am thrilled with the quality.
Tanya Bond’s artwork is incredible with her iconic big eyed girls most of which have their lovely animal friend as well. These books are printed on one side with gorgeous thick paper. You won’t be disappointed. YES, they are more expensive than on Amazon but if you are a paper snob like I am, it’s worth it.
Maria Trolle another of my favorite Swedish illustrators has a book releasing in 2018 “Nightfall Coloring Book“: Originally Published in Sweden as “Skymningstimman“. It is already available in Sweden so there are lovely colored in photos floating around on social media. Maria’s books are the gorgeous hardback style that is simply a dream for colorists to collect.
As you can see Chrissy the Coloring Book Addict’s favorite coloring book choices tend towards pretty, detailed and flowery coloring books with top quality paper. If you think there are any I need to check out feel free to buzz me on social media.
Keep Coloring! ~ Chrissy
If you are new to coloring or just want to dive in a little deeper be sure to read our expansive supply recommendations along with our tips and tricks articles.
If you haven’t experienced coloring in a Good Wives and Warriors coloring book yet, you are in for a treat. The first one of their books I chose was Escape to Wonderland, my first Alice in Wonderland coloring book as well. The illustrations are completely unique with a fun twist on your favorite fairy tales and other whimsical notions.
London-based Becky Bolton and Louise Chappell, have been working collaboratively as Good Wives and Warriors since 2007, soon after graduating from the Painting Department at The Glasgow School of Art. To date, they have produced 6 coloring books for adults along with a coffee table book of black and white illustrations that does invite you to explore and color it as well.
Their latest book is said to be the longest coloring book in the world.
Come on a new magical colouring adventure, from your home right the way to the ends of the earth. You’ll find a world of dragons, witches, lagoons, mountains, and deserts, inspired by folk tales and landscapes from around the globe. The coloring book folds horizontally and is a 17-foot long adventure!
I’ve yet to see this book so if you have it, please post pictures and tag us on social media. I’d love to see it!
Where the “Ends of the Earth” book is the longest… what I love about the quartet of Escape books is their nice compact size. They are perfect for sticking into your bag or backpack along with a roll of pencils and having a fun project always handy. The pages lay down nice and flat and since there are two artists that work on and collaborate on all their books, if you get tired of one style of illustration, just move to the other artist’s pages. These 4 books are over 90 pages of illustrations printed on both sides of the paper in a smallish square of 7.3″ x 7.3″. The paper is a little big of a cream color, similar to Johanna’s Secret Garden book. I think you’ll love all four editions.
Alice in Wonderland books are the most popular fairy tale coloring on the site. Personally, I think the story is creepy and a bit too dark but apparently, I’m the only non-fan. I do however absolutely LOVE the GGAW Escape to Wonderland Coloring book. You’ll be able to fall down the rabbit hole with Alice and color in the magical world filled with the rabbit, the cat and other familiar characters.
You might know Steve “Squidoodle” Turner from his generous sharing of his incredibly unique black and white illustrations that he posts on many of the Coloring Book groups on Facebook. Indeed that’s how I discovered his quirky and imaginative doodle creatures and creations.
Steve’s latest and greatest creation is Skull Doodles! This isn’t your regular skull coloring book you know, for your coloring pleasure you’ll find sugar skulls, patterned skulls, skull mandalas, dinosaur skulls, unicorn skulls and other creations from this prolific illustrator.
Steve launched his second highly detailed coloring book in November of 2015. It includes all the letters of the alphabet with each letter filled with creatures and items that start with that letter.
All 26 letters of the alphabet, on single side pages with doodles items to color in. Taken from the intricate hand drawn pen drawings of Steve Turner a.k.a Squidoodle. Each letter is detailed and ornate, with doodled items beginning with that letter. Try and spot as many as you can! As well as the 26 letters of the alphabet there are four added symbols – & + = and a heart. Each letter sits centrally on the page, away from the spine – you can cut the letters out, color them and give them as gifts to family or friends.
All the pages inside this book are taken from the hand-drawn illustrations by Steve Squidoodle Turner. I carefully selected items to be contained in each letter – making it fun for kids and adults alike. The A contains an astronaut, an apple, an aeroplane, an anchor…. The B contains a bee, Big Ben, a beetle, balloons…. you get the idea!!
Steve kindly agreed to answer a few questions so you could get to know where his inspiration comes from and how the mind of an artist works.
Coloring Book Artist Steve “Squidoodle” Turner Q & A
Q. What do you Enjoy Drawing the Most? A. I love drawing animals the Most
Q. How did you get started? A. I’ve always drawn but only recently started taking it seriously. I mainly draw because it’s therapeutic.
Q. Who or what is your inspiration? A. I draw inspiration from nature and mechanics and the interesting contradiction between them.
Q. What materials do you enjoy using the most? A. Fineline pens and drawing pads.
Q. Do you like to color in your designs or prefer to have others do that? A. I prefer it when other people colour my work because it creates something completely different. I never do a drawing just for colouring, I envisage them as black and white so when someone colours my drawing, it takes on a whole new identity which is fantastic.
Q. What supplies or brands do you recommend for your book or designs? A. For colouring in I’ve heard prismacolour pencils are pretty good. Sharpies are bold but they bleed a little. I’d like to see someone colour my drawing with pastels.
Q. What is your favorite thing to do when you aren’t doing art? A. Apart from drawing, I like going away camping in my old campervan. But I still take a sketchbook with me….
Bonus! I asked Steve if there was anything else I should ask that his fans might want to know about him. He came up with the question…”What’s the strangest thing you’ve drawn?” A. I did a commissioned drawing of the entire digestive system. It was really unusual and fun and I actually learned a lot doing it.
Steve’s first coloring books is available on Amazon
In Steve’s words….. My first coloring book for grown-ups or kids! Squidoodle’s Adventures in Colouring and Doodling is an A4 (For we Yanks that’s 8 1/2 x 11 letter size) It’s a 16-page coloring book, on single sides, featuring all the favorites: Ornate owl, campervan, dragon, Steampunk and more. Color it in, Doodle the backgrounds….or both! Printed on single sides so if you use pens, it doesn’t matter if they go through. Many of the designs have white areas for you to complete in your own doodle style.
Steve created this detailed Breast Cancer Ribbon for everyone to color-in in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness month of October. He would love to see you color it in and post it to his Facebook page. He’s been overwhelmed with how many people have downloaded and colored.
*****GRAB YOUR PINK PENS AND COLOUR FOR BREAST CANCER AWARENESS MONTH*****
Let’s raise some money!! As you all know, October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I have drawn a doodle-ribbon, with flowers, hearts, butterflies, a “There is always hope” scroll, leaves, diamonds, a dove, a glass of wine and loads more. I want you all to color it. In hot pinks.. pencils, pens, whatever you fancy. All I ask, is that if you download, print it and color it, please take a photo of your colouring and make a small donation to the Cancer charity of your choice. Then send me the photo and I’ll create an album on my page, of all the wonderful colored ribbons. Make sure you share this so others can get involved. You don’t need to tell me who you have donated to, or how much, but if you do we can get a better idea of how much we can raise.
How do I find good adult coloring books and avoid the bad ones?
Being able to find good coloring books online can be a challenge. I see so many frustrated people when reading reviews on Amazon and Facebook about ordering a coloring book online that has an amazing cover but when it arrives they are less than happy.
There are several ways to help avoid disappointment when it comes to choosing a coloring book.
Get to know the features on Amazon
Reading through the listing thoroughly on Amazon will give you quite a few clues straight away if you know where to look.
At the top of each coloring book listing is an author section. A reputable artist or publishing company will have created an artist page and if you click on that link you’ll be lead to all of the other books they have published. A quick glance down the page will reveal reviews of their other books if the one you are looking at happens to be new and not have any reviews.
Don’t feel too bad if it happens to you! Even we “professional” coloring book reviewers get duped once in awhile. Check out the Coloring Queen’s video review of her Dud Coloring Book.
Amazon Reviews
You should read the good and the bad reviews but also look for those that say “verified”. Verified reviewers are simply those that have purchased that item from Amazon. Next, you need to decide if they are fake reviews by friends, or paid for reviews. It doesn’t mean that ALL people that aren’t verified are fake reviews, far from it because you may have bought the book at Barnes & Noble, Walmart or the dollar store and you want to tell all the people on Amazon what you thought.
Next, you should try to figure out if this person is someone who is paid to review coloring books. I can kind of tell if that is the case if the person goes on and on and ON and repeats the same phrases in all their reviews. If you click on the reviewer you can see all the reviews they have done. It will also give you a feel for whether or not they are the sort that only gives 5* reviews or someone who only gets online to complain. Neither of those sorts are terribly helpful.
I also take into account what people ding a book for. When someone leaves a 1-star review for a book or coloring product because it was bent or broken in the mail, that’s not relevant. You can review the shipping method, the shipper, the company that sold it to you but don’t ding the book itself. It’s not the artist’s fault that your book cover was bent.
What do YOU like to color?
Figure out what you like to color. I know that sounds simple but just because you LIKE a certain thing, doesn’t mean you’ll enjoy coloring it. I adore dogs but I don’t particularly like to color them. I also do enjoy coloring a ton of repeated patterns or what they call “wallpaper” pages where the background is the same behind the main image and you have to color it in.
Coloring Book Topics
There are a ton of flower coloring and cute critter coloring but if you love mermaids, you will find a boatload of books that feature mermaids. Science Fiction nut? There are coloring books that feature your favorite shows or characters. I recently saw a coloring book of serial killers! Not my favorite topic but for some, that sort of book interests them. How about positive phrases, quotes or bible verses. This is really important if you are going to buy a coloring book for a gift. Think about what that person loves and then search that phrase on Amazon. For example Dog Coloring Books for Adults.
How to Use Amazon Search for the Best Coloring Books
If you click on that link for the dog coloring books above, I’ve also added the parameter to only pull up books with a 4* or higher rating. By using some of these search parameters, you can really narrow down your search so you aren’t overwhelmed and you get to the books you’d really like to take the time to explore.
If you look to the left of the search bar you’ll see the options listed below.
Amazon Prime
Get it by Tomorrow
Eligible for Free Shipping
Department
Average Customer Review
Book Series
New Releases
Last 30 Days
Last 90 days
Coming Soon
By using these search parameters above, you can really control how the search behaves for you. Do remember to add in the “Adult Coloring” or “Coloring for Grownups” so you don’t get books intended for little kids.
Paper Quality in Coloring Books
A large amount of the coloring books that you’ll see on Amazon are from new artists and illustrators aren’t yet working with a publisher so those books are created using Amazon’s author network called CreateSpace. This is not great paper, it’s ok paper but it’s not going to be the luscious paper of a Johanna Basford or Hanna Karlzon book. They are also likely to have fewer pages and fewer illustrations. Below is an example of what you will find on every coloring book on Amazon. It shows the number of pages and the Publisher (you’ll see this is CreateSpace) along with the product dimensions and the average review score. It’s all right there for you so be sure to check that so you aren’t disappointed that it’s smaller than you thought, or it’s got average copier paper. You know you can always copy it to cardstock for your own use so I don’t let the subpar paper keep me away if I love the illustrations. I’m using this book to illustrate what I’m talking about.
This one gives you information right in the description about how many images there are and that it’s Single-sided black backed coloring pages. It also tells you there are 25 images. If you look at the number of pages you’ll see 67 so that would be confusing to me right off the bat. Does the illustrator give you sneak peeks at the rest of the Nice Little Town series? What is on all those other pages? I looked at a flip through of another book in the series and there were 11 pictures from her other books, that still doesn’t add up?
Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review:4.4 out of 5 stars 37 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #15,351 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
#78 in Christmas (Books)
#50 in Religious & Inspirational Coloring Books for Grown-Ups
So, you’ll see that you get less illustrations and lower quality paper but the cost is also 1/2 or less than the professionally published & edited books.
To contrast a CreateSpace publication, let me show you Hanna Karlzon’s newest book.
Drawn in Hanna’s highly regarded detailed style, this hardbound coloring book of 96 pages on thick paper printed on both sides of the paper.
Hardcover: 96 pages
Publisher: Gibbs Smith (August 13, 2019)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1423652797
ISBN-13: 978-1423652793
Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 0.7 x 9.9 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review:4.9 out of 5 stars 24 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #58,658 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
#72 in Illustration and Graphic Design
#277 in Animal Coloring Books for Grown-Ups
You’ll see that this one contains more than double the amount of pictures to color, on much nicer paper in a hard-bound book and of course, the price is higher. These are the things you need to compare when shopping online.
Remember that on Amazon, returns are super easy to make as long as you don’t wait too long, now you can even return things at Kohls. Don’t stress yourself out too much.
I hope this helps you not to worry about purchasing your next adult coloring book online.
Looking back through 2018 it was interesting to see which books sold the most copies as well as which were the favorite coloring supplies. I also tracked anything that was returned. I was quite surprised to find a book I hadn’t even recognized in the number 1 position at 106 copies.
As someone addicted to adult coloring books, you know I have a GIANT stockpile of coloring books in my art room library and have often been disappointed to find the pictures inside the book weren’t a thing like the cover or are printed awkwardly on the page etc. I decided to make it easier on my readers and give them an advance flip through of all the coloring books I have (at least that’s the plan). I love getting books from publishers & artists so of course, I try to get to those first before the one’s I’ve purchased but eventually I’ll get to them all. If there is a certain book you’d like to see that you have seen me coloring in on social media, please comment on it and I’ll do my best for you.
Adult Coloring Book Reviews on Youtube
I tend to chatter throughout so you might not want to watch too many of these in a row or you will get REALLY tired of the sound of my voice!! lol
Come on a new magical colouring adventure, from your home right the way to the ends of the earth. You’ll find a world of dragons, witches, lagoons, mountains, and deserts, inspired by folk tales and landscapes from around the globe. The coloring book folds horizontally and is a 17-foot long adventure!
” Coloring Book by Alan Roberts 
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