Maple and Willow Together

Maple and Willow Together written and illustrated by Lori Nichols (2014)

This is the follow up to the delightful story Maple published earlier this year. Maple was Lori Nichols debut picture book. You can read my review of Maple HERE.

In this book, Maple and her little sister Willow do everything together. They play together, sleep together, and even have their own special language together. But one day, Maple gets angry and Willow gets angry and they are sent to their rooms alone. The girls don’t like being alone, and make-up across the hallway. Pretty soon they are playing outside together and sleeping together in the same bed.

Lori Nichols has done it again! This second book is just as warm and loving as her first book. The relationship between the sisters is so real. And the artwork is beautiful. It shows how sisters can be each other’s best friends even when they don’t always get along.

I love this story and I think you will too. I can’t wait to share it with my granddaughter who just became a big sister last month!

This Orq. (He Cave Boy)

This Orq. (He Cave Boy) written by  David Elliott and illustrated by Lori Nichols (2014)

Orq is a cave boy. And he loves Woma, a wooly mammoth. But Woma sheds, is smelly, and is not house-trained. Orq’s mother wants Woma out of the cave. Orq decides to teach Woma tricks so his mother would love her too, but Woma just doesn’t get the hang of it. Then one day while Orq is playing that he is a mighty hunter, a sabertooth tiger stalks him. Woma appears just in time to save Orq from the sabertooth. Now Orq’s mother loves Woma!

David Elliott has created two wonderful new characters in this book. Orq is an imaginative young cave boy like most little boys today and Woma is just the kind of pet any young cave boy would love. The cave-talk language is perfectly blended with standard English and gives it the total feel of authenticity.

Lori Nichols has done a superb job of bring cave boys and wooly mammoths back from extinction. Her details in artwork mix modern and prehistoric elements seamlessly. She has convinced the reader that cave boys not only had pet wooly mammoths, but also played with stone wheeled tricycles and used colored pencils to draw pictures on cave walls.

I love this story! Orq and Woma are so convincingly real, I want to take them home with me. This is a book I would love to see made into a series.

Me love Orq… you will too!

Maple

Maple written and illustrated by Lori Nichols (2014)

This story is quiet and funny and honors children and their families. Maple’s parents planted a tree ‘while she was still a whisper’. And as Maple grew so did her tree. She played with her tree, she pretended to be a tree, and she took care of her tree. But sometimes Maple wished she had someone else to play with and she wondered if her tree felt the same way. Then one day Maple notices a seedling growing near her tree and soon she became a big sister to Willow. Maple and Willow played together under the shade of their trees.

Lori Nichols tells a story of growing families with the natural analogy of growing trees. The text is short and simple, but the ideas are deep and powerful. And like her text, her illustrations are also pure and simple. The innocence of the child is a wonder!

This is Lori Nichols first picture book, and I hope she has many more to come. I would love to see Maple and Willow grow up and experience lots of life’s little ups and downs.