Title: Dr. Sketchy's Official Rainy Day Colouring Book Author: Molly Crabapple and John Leavitt Publisher: Sepulculture Books Publish Date: 2006 Pages: 182 Genres:: Fantasy, Erotic Art Reviewer: Chris R. Morgan

Rating:

To label this a coloring book is a tad misleading. Although this book is indeed filled with black-and-white outlined cartoon renderings of robust, hourglass-shaped boys and girls, there is a bit more versatility to Dr. Sketchy, the name of the "anti" art school that put this together. If you're one that has the burning urge and curiosity to combine, say, a love for naked goth chicks and risque cut-outs, this is for you. In addition, if you like none of the former, but have nothing else better to do and Kid Nation isn't as funny as you thought it would be, this could fill the void just as easily. 

The aesthetic world that Ms. Crabapple and Mr. Leavitt have manifested is displayed in full within these pages. In here, you will find the bawdy, campy and mildly subversive atmosphere that came with a speakeasy or a burlesque show. Pictures of art models are styled from the combined influence of goth, bondage and cabaret. Dispersed elsewhere are a variety of features that range from the humorous to the childish—the kind of childishness that only sex can rocket into acceptable maturity. Most of which, if you've been following carefully, is art-based. Did you ever want to know how being an art model serves Ayn Rand's objectivist ideal? Or perhaps did you want to get a good laugh as you try to figure out which art class stereotype you were/are? 

There's is a world of fancy-free raunchiness, clever/dirty humor, kink, culture both high and low and, above all, community. Dr. Sketchy is in many locations all over the developed world. A portion of this book is a promotional device with contributions and comments from all the different collectives be they from Melbourne or Phoenix. Among the games and perverted frolicking are interviews, testimonials and instructionals on all things Dr. Sketchy. What Crabapple and Leavitt accomplish is not often successful. Though the central theme is their group, the book is haphazardly organized, which seems what they were going for. Never before have I seen a book that was specifically put together to quell boredom and inspire creativity at the same time. Though I've never played it before, I'm sure sudoku is overrated.