Unboxing And Review: LitJoy Crate January 2020

“Starry Night”

The theme for LitJoy’s first box of 2020 was “Starry Night” and I’m all for anything to do with stars, sleep, celestial-ness (this is a word, right?) … yep. Big fan.

Here’s what was inside:

Favourite item is most definitely, most ardently, the Strange the Dreamer pillowcase. I love, love, love Strange the Dreamer and lament often (& loudly) at the lack of Strange merchandise. I’m in love with this pillowcase designed by the talented Evie Seo (eviebookish).

The Darkling’s “Cult of the Starless” trinket box. This wooden, cylindrical box features the cult of the starless branding on the top of the lid and has a nifty magnetic closure. I thought this was a really neat, unique item that I haven’t seen before. I am currently using it to store my plethora of hair ties, and I think this will be a very useful item for many. Artwork was designed by Maggie Rose (maggie.rose.studio).

Doctor Who Twist headband. This is another really unique item featuring Doctor Who crossed with Van Gogh’s Starry Night, which I’ve been informed references a particular Doctor Who episode. I was really excited to receive this as I had just started watching Doctor Who the week my box arrived! It’s a nice headband that actually stays in place, not slipping around – which is a problem I have with a lot of headbands in book boxes.

Night Court inspired Dreamcatcher. I love dream catchers, they are absolutely up my decorating style, and I see where they were going with this item … but three little hot-glued stars on a dreamcatcher does not a “Night Court” item make. I would’ve rather they just included a dreamcatcher as this still totally fits the theme of Starry Night! But more so, this item is not very high quality, with lots of hanging bits of hot glue clumps and those annoying hot glue strings, and the feathers (yarn pieces) were all tangled & crimped. I like it, but I also think the quality here is very lacking.

The monthly trading cards this month were from Nevernight – Tric, Mia, and Ashlinn. The artwork is by Tamar Vashadze.

The book pick for January is Woven in Moonlight by Isabel Ibanez. This book came with a reversible dust jacket (artwork by the author), an author letter, and was signed by the author. I’m very happy that this book was included as I was definitely going to be purchasing it!

Overall Rating: A

• Pillowcase: 4/3 (Just so very happy to have a beautiful Strange the Dreamer item!!

• The Darkling wooden trinket box: 3/3

• Doctor Who headband: 3/3

• Night Court Dreamcatcher: 1/3 (really poor quality on this item)

This was a really great box, full of items I personally enjoy and fandoms I love. The dreamcatcher was a bit of disappointment because of quality, but I do appreciate the unique items LitJoy includes in their boxes.

*I do feel the need to warn international customers that LitJoy has once again drastically increased the cost of shipping, raised the overall price of the box, and still has not resolved the issue of charging tax … which results in another $10 fee upon delivery. For Canadians a monthly box will end up costing just under $83/month, absolutely the highest cost of all book boxes. After repeated contact with the company they have expressed they have no plans to change shipping partners or address this issue anytime in the near future. While I really love this box, I feel it important to warn about those costs, I myself will unfortunately not be continuing my subscription after my three month subscription has ended in April.

Note on Rating: I rate each item out of 3 possible points: 1 for quality, 1 for usefulness, and 1 for if I personally liked the item/fandom. I then assign an overall letter rating for the whole box.