Onyinye Iwu: Hi, my name is Onyinye Iwu, and I am the illustrator of the Too Small Tola series, and today we're going to be speaking about Too Small Tola Gets Tough. I really loved that this book reflected what we were all experiencing over the past, say maybe two years ago, during the pandemic. It was really interesting to see how the pandemic was experienced in another country, especially in Nigeria in Africa. And it was quite a tough book, I would say. It was exciting, but it was tough to illustrate because there was a lot of sad moments. And even if Too Small Tola does have her challenges, this time around she is really experiencing a lot of difficulties, to the point where she might be finding it difficult to eat because people are not allowed to go into work. She's separated from her family. And all of this was very emotional, but it opened my eyes to the realities of a lot of children all over the world and how they were affected by the pandemic.

So, just like most of the other Tola books, I had a read of the book and from there I started, sort of, looking into the rough draft images of what the different pages were going to have. And then after that I settled on some designs. I think the good thing about drawing this third book is by now I know my characters, I know their environments, so it was really good to, sort of, go back to a familiar, sort of, place. However, it was also nice to draw something a bit different, which was a new environment for Tola. So, if you read the book, you will know that Tola goes into a new environment towards the end of the book. And it was good to design new characters and new spaces, and see what Tola was like somewhere else other than with her grandma, her brother, and her sister. So, yeah, that was my process.

You did a good job. And by that I mean that we all had it tough, including Tola, including her family, but anybody that reads this book, I'm sure you have been affected in one way or another by the pandemic. Maybe you were at home a lot, maybe you had to share space with a lot of people in your house and it was tough. But we came through, and, you know, well done. And I really do hope that this book gives you some inspiration and a positive outlook on everything that has happened and how we can move forward together.