(Sarah Read is an author, editor, yarn artist, and pen/paper/ink addict. You can find more about her at her website and on Twitter. And check out her latest book, Out of Water, now available where books are sold!)
For someone who loves notebooks so much, I sure do write a lot on scratch paper. The back of a receipt? In the margins of an unrelated document? On a tiny square of paper saved from the recycling bin? Post-it notes? That's where I write the most important things. What could possibly go wrong? Everything, that's what. And I'm forever looking for solutions to save me from myself.
Leuchtturm1917 are well established as quality notebooks, and I love using their standard A5 model, so I was pleased to see that the Reporter Notepad has all the same features. A smooth leather hardcover with an elastic band closure keeps everything secure. Inside, there's a name page, followed by a few pages for an index. I was surprised to see the index for a small notepad--but these pages are numbered, just like in their larger notebooks. This is extra useful, as the things that get written in this sort of book tend to be random and disorganized. The index will save me from having to flip through the book looking for random notes.
This notepad has grid lines in faint grey on 94 sheets of cream paper. That's 188 pages if you use both sides--which is trickier to do with a notepad, but I'll do it. There's a small margin at the top of each page for a header, and a narrow margin around the bottom and sides, giving the edges a clean look.
Inside the back cover is their usual pocket for bits of paper--just in case you still write on scraps. You'll be less likely to, though, because this notepad offers an excellent writing experience. The paper is fantastic, standing up to nearly any ink. Even the Sharpie only showed through where the pen tip paused. The rest has almost no show-through. The binding on this is also sturdy enough that it can be folded back around on itself, if you want to hold it compactly.
Overall, this may be one of the best reporter-style notepads I've used. Most that I've tried are spiral-bound, which works for the flip-over, but they don't hold onto papers as well, tend to get warped, and snag in pockets. They also lack the fancy features that Leuchtturm adds, like the pocket and index. I'm hoping this book will help me cut down on scrap writing, especially at work, where I scribble a note every few minutes. Maybe someday I'll find the three separate scraps of paper that all have the same chiropractor recommendation on them, but in the meantime, I'll just have to ask for that rec one more time, and write it safely in this book.
(JetPens provided this product at no charge to The Pen Addict for review purposes.)
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