The Bluebell Wood

Kelly Wright, a pre-school teaching assistant from Berkhamsted, has written her first picture book, ‘The Bluebell Wood’.

It is about a little girl who loves exploring and her favourite place to go is in the bluebell wood she has many friends there: a Badger, a Hedgehog, a Mole and a Robin. She explores with them in the wood and they play games such as hide and seek and follow my leader, and listen to all the woodland sounds.

It is a sweet and gentle story portraying simplicity and innocence through her love of exploring and the friendship she has with her animal friends.

The book is based on Kelly’s own childhood memories when she played and explored in a bluebell wood.

Kelly did a 10-week Writing for Children course at The City University in London back in 2013 where she learnt how to write and put together a picture book. At the end of the course her tutor asked to see a draft sketch pad of her picture book and said it was worth publishing.

Kelly told us, ‘I persevered for 4 years to get it published as I believed in my picture book and as my memories of playing in the bluebell wood were so strong and the animals were all very real, I knew I wanted to keep on trying to achieve what I believed was possible to do.’

Kelly collaborated with an illustrator to capture her memories on paper and create the animal characters she remembers so fondly and the vivid scenery of the bluebell wood with its beautiful green, purple and blue colours.

She says, ‘My favourite page is where the little girl is playing hide and seek with her friends. I love the simplicity of the illustrations.

‘At the age of 7 I had written a story similar to this one and have kept it all these years later.’

The Bluebell Wood is a picture book for pre-school aged children and for anyone who has a love of bluebells!

Kelly has dedicated it to her nieces and nephew, who she loves very much.

The book will be sold as part of The National Trust and will be in the Ashridge visitors centre and in all other surrounding bluebell woods across the region. Kelly will be doing a book signing at Ashridge at the end of April.

The picture book is available from Waterstones in Berkhamsted or online from Amazon and WHSmith.