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We feel about the limited edition The Hobbit Moleskine clothbound notebook the same way we feel about the third episode in The Hobbit trilogy: We’ll get it because we have the previous editions, and we kind of like it, but we acknowledge that it doesn’t have to exist.

This one is boxed and clothbound. Yay. (Say that exactly the way Sean Bean’s Boromir in the mines of Moria said, “They have a cave troll.”) With a handwriting sample of J.R.R. Tolkien’s on the cover, so more money for his descendants.

And there’s a map in it…just like the earlier notebooks. What a surprise.

The endpapers are facsimiles of the original illustrations by Tolkien, and there are 7 pages of illustrations and 8 quotes inside—the same illustrations and quotes that appear in last year’s notebook and the year before last year’s notebook.

However, this Hobbit Moleskine is available only with lined pages, no version with plain pages. We prefer plain pages because strangely, we can write straight lines, but when there are lines our writing goes in all directions.

The Hobbit Moleskine boxed and clothbound notebook is available at National Bookstores, Php2,240.

Speaking of new isn’t necessarily better, there’s a new Lego Moleskine notebook in blue.

Compare it to the black one that came out a couple of years ago.

True, this one has stickers so you can customize the cover…

Naah, it doesn’t make that much difference. Available at National Bookstores, Php1,580.

It’s back to plain monochromatic Moleskines for us for now.