THE LITTLE MERMAID: An Under-The-Sea Coloring Adventure

The newest addition to the adult coloring book craze comes in the form of THE LITTLE MERMAID: A COLORING BOOK. However, don’t go into this looking for Flounder, Sebastian, and Ursula; this coloring book is based on the original story by Hans Christian Andersen, not the popular Disney movie. The illustrations seem to have been drawn by several different artists, and you can find the names associated with each page at the back of the book.

The Little Mermaid Coloring Book features full page (and many two-page spread) images to color. There are also colorable quotes from the original fairytale that make it look like a picture book. However it is not a complete story; think of it as a coloring book with random, eye-catching quotes from the original fairytale.

The images are lovely and allow for plenty of creativity. While most pictures take place under the sea, there is enough diversity of plants, animals, mermaids, and boats to ensure you won’t just be using those same blue and green colored pencils the whole time. I enjoyed having words and quotes to color as well – which isn’t something that most coloring books offer. As is unfortunately the case with a lot of coloring books, The Little Mermaid prints its images too close to the binding, making it nearly impossible to color the entire image (which is especially frustrating with two-page spread coloring images). Along those lines, the binding doesn’t completely lie flat as you’re coloring. I hope in the future publishers will begin printing their coloring books with a format more conducive to coloring and less like a regular book (for which the binding structure matters less). For an example of a book with a great binding that facilitates coloring, check out Joanna Basford’s beautiful coloring books.

Overall, this is a fun, engaging, and beautifully illustrated book that I look forward to filling with color.