Happy Mail

What a delightful little book! Letter writing is a dying art and it's refreshing to see someone keeping it alive in such innovative ways. This book is colorful and fun, and it provides tons of inspiration for those of us who enjoy creative letter writing and card making. I appreciate that they included details about the tools they use. I am definitely going to borrow their ideas the next time I write a letter, and I will definitely recommend it to be purchased for my library collection. My only criticism is that I wish it were longer!

Happy Mail is a great idea for encouraging young people to indulge in the unfortunately often neglected art of letter-writing. It encourages sending letters to friends and family for no reason other than 'just because', which I love. I had expected there to be more tips about how to actually do lettering (as in basics of calligraphy and the weighting of pen strokes) rather than how to fake the lettering, but actually this works well as a starting point. There are lots of great ideas of how to embellish and decorate letters, ideas of what to send, and a few challenges. The physical copy of this book actually includes tear-out perforated cards which I think is a great touch. The book has plenty of ideas, and the illustrations are clear and fun. This is a great book for crafty types.

This book is a work of art, beautiful illustrations and plenty of tips and guides to have a go at creating your very own gorgeous handwritten happy mail!


Full of bright pastel colours popping against a pure write background to add colour the a page of text, images of letter designs are clear and simple with the guides for how to achieve them yourself.

There are loads of letter/card/envelope designs you can copy and print off yourself to use as well as colour in cards you could colour for someone or send plain to give them some fun too.


I'm going to get plenty of use from this book, there's something amazing about sending a letter the classic way not just an email!


Many thanks to the publishers for allowing me to review this book for them!

This book is great for kids, teenagers and anyone looking for some letter writing inspiration. There are art and craft projects, handwriting guides and hints and tips to encourage kids to write letters. It is beautifully presented and could keep kids busy for hours. Although I'm not the target audience, I enjoyed flicking through and ended up with a handful ideas of things to make and do myself.

UHM OKAY.

Anyone who knows me knows I have a passion for stationary and letter writing. I have a board dedicated to it on Pinterest, have written MULTIPLE posts about writing letters on my blog, and have an entire drawer full of stationary. In short, I'm pretty sure this book was written for me.

Because it was an eArc, I didn't have the chance to do the lettering in the front of the book but I have plans to pull out some paper and the recommended pens and give the styles a try! Hand lettering seems unapproachable to people with little artistic talent but the directions to the lettering- and the handmade cards, for that matter- were clear and simple and I'm sure easy to follow.

The cards-- so cute, and totally doable. Though I haven't tried any of them yet, I am totally going to try a few, ESPECIALLY the one for random holidays. What a great idea for sending letters just because! The pictures are all high-quality and exactly the kind of style that appeals to me (again, did they read my mind or what?). Will totally be referring back to this when I'm feeling particularly crafty.

As for recommending/buying... I want this book in physical copy, especially for the stationary at the back! I really hope my local library where I work as an intern in the children's section (I sit desk for the most part!) gets this, because it's so cute and letter writing needs to live on!!!

As far as upcoming reviews/mentions, I plan to:
a) YouTube: books I read in July wrap up
b) YouTube: I'll make one of the cards and send it-- will do this video when the book is closer to release.

Well, this is adorable! Yes, it's short - think of it as some sweet ideas and style inspiration just to get you started. Now I want to get some paper and marker pens, and send everyone cute post. Who wants a letter?
(I will be tweeting about this book on its publication day.)

This is such a cute and fun book. I love that it encourages letter writing, hand writing and creativity and DIY projects! It goes back to basics encouraging beginners as well as more experienced makers which is a great thing. Beautifully presented with lots of inspiration and projects to follow along, we will definitely be featuring this in the Sarah Hurley Book Club for a craft pick closer to publication date!

I was lucky enough to receive an advanced copy of this book from Netgalley. Since my granddaughter and I are doing art this summer, I thought working on some of these DIY projects would be fun, until I saw everyone used a craft knife. That’s not a good idea for younger kids. As I read farther into the book, I also noticed there were only one or two illustrations for each project. I and all the kids I know need an illustration for each step in the instructions. That leaves nothing to chance. The different alphabets are cute and clever. Plus the idea of sending handwritten notes should be emphasized as much as possible, which the authors accomplished here. The book would have been better had the author’s assumed their readers had zero knowledge of letter writing.

This is a very cute book filled with fun ideas. I love all of the designs and the tutorials are easy to follow. This book is so inspiring to me. Very recommended!

I received this book from Netgalley in exchange of an honest review.

How awesome is this book, it encourages creativity, fun and gifting people happiness through the mail. Yes I said mail, yes people do still send mail and often it is the happy goodness that you see in this book. This book has so much goodness in it and I totally need a hard copy for myself now.
The book is very practical along with the fun parts of it. The author has made suggestions for what tools would be good for letter writing, giving instructions on how to address your letter, prompts of what to write, and a 30 day letter writing challenge. However, it doesn’t stop there that is only the beginning of what this book has to offer.
The book is bright, colourful and very inviting. There are opportunities to practice different styles of lettering in the book to make your mail that little bit more fun, alongside some project to make your happy mail funky. Each of the ideas are fun, and the part I love is that they are also encouraging. Lovely words, phrases and messages are used to let someone know how special they are, or to congratulate them or wishing them a happy birthday.
What I love most about this book is the pull out stationary at the back of the book. It looks gorgeous, is colourful and fun, with something for all ages to use.
It’s fresh and exciting and a must have for any tween or teenager (oh, and adult too).

It’s sad to think that we might now need books that tell us how to mail letters, but it is becoming a lost art form. Well, this book is trying to bring that back. It not only has places to practice various types of hand lettering, it tell you how to write a letter in the first place, and then has some wildly fun cards and envelopes that you can make as well. With the uptick in pen pals, it’s time to dust off your stationary and give this a try.

I love it!!
I've always loved creative books, and books that look FABULOUS. This one totally amazed me.
Authors provided tips and ideas on creating handmade letters and envelopes, and even provided a few unbelievably adorable templates for readers to copy and cut out. The book itself is well designed, with colorful illustrations, attractive page design and a cover too fabulous to ignore, this book will definitely attract lots of girls when it's out on the shelf.
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Overall: 4.8/5
Illustrations: 5/5
Creativeness: 4.5/5
Cover: 5/5
Writing: 4/5
Appealing: 5/5
Will I buy it? Yeah, I will.

I requested this one from Netgalley for my sheer nostalgic love of letter writing and all things stationery. Who knew one would need a how-to book on how to write letters in this day and age? I had so many penpals as a child, I loved writing and receiving letters in the mail. I really miss it. The book is cute, lovely, I love the pretty lettering tips, the beautiful office supplies. A nice book to give as a gift to children/teens who life crafts, and who knows, they can revive handwriting letters?

I am a complete stationery nerd. I have always loved pens, gel pens, fountain pens, ink, glitter, paper (handmade paper makes me weak in the knees), washi tape, notebooks, etc etc. I absolutely love handwritten notes. I, in short, am a freak. Eunice and Sabrina get it.
The problem of course is that when most of us sit down in front of a blank piece of paper, we choke. We run out of ideas (if we had any to start with).

This book primes the pump. It is jam packed with great tips and ideas, including, yes, templates which one can follow slavishly if one needs a gentle push. It's a beautiful, colorful, exuberant book. Even though it's relatively short, it is full of everything necessary to get started really changing someone's day. Think how happy the recipient of your time and effort will be.

Although this book is aimed at younger readers, it's absolutely perfect for anyone with a sense of fun.

I loved this book.

A good book packed with ideas and suggestions for creating your very own greeting/invitation cards, letters and much more. Will take you back to a world where people connected through words, paper and mail. Very encouraging and creative!

This was such a fun book and I am really happy I had a chance to read it. 

The book is all about making fun letters, cards, envelopes. At times quite detailed on how to make the items, but at other times it is quite simple and easy. I liked the diversity. That way someone can pick if they want to make something big or something small. Also I quite like that they had various themes. From something for a friend to something for a stranger. 

I had a big laugh that they needed to explain how a letter works and how you had to send it/put an address on it. Man, I feel old if that is truly needed to be added these days. 

Of course the ebook/pdf has its disadvantages. The text is really tiny because instead of seeing one page, you see two pages. Zooming in works, but that makes the flipping of pages finicky. Plus all the nice extras at the end (or at the beginning)? That is worthless for an ebook. :( 

But all in all, a very colourful and fun book, and I may try out a few of the examples as soon as I find some materials/pens/etc.. I would recommend it to everyone interested in crafts and/or wants to write letters to friends and family.