About Kidsbooke.com

School kid Aggie pushes the screen of her iPad towards the reader with an expression of alarmed intensity.


Portrait photo of John Arthur Nichol, author of the Sascha Martin books for kids.John Arthur Nichol


About KidsBooke (that's the website)
and the books (without an e) ...
They're the logical extension
of the rhyming OCD

Of one John Arthur Nichol,* children's
author (laughs a lot at times),
Who devotes a lot of leisure
to pursuing proper rhymes




The Demon Duck of Doom, a giant prehistoric bird, lifts Aggie in its beak in a scene from the book Sascha Martin's Time Machine, a fun time travel adventure for kids.


And telling stories, with a rhythm,
whose most serious remit
Is inciting kids to laughter
(and their parents, I admit)

There are times I think that prose,
perhaps, would better serve instead,
But the stories only come to me
as verses in my head

*Yes, the name is quite a mouthful,
all those syllables it spends,
But I'm forced to use my middle name
cause others use the ends.




A comical blowfly from the Pleistocene in the children's book Sascha Martin's Time Machine.



About KidsBooke Illustrations


Here's the illustrator, full of
fire and vision and delight
For creating all the images
of anything I write ... **

She is resident in Italy,
and native there as well,
Relocated to an island
off Sardinia to dwell

Where she runs a bed and breakfast
when the tourists are in town,
So the Season cuts the time
she has for illustrating down.



School kid Aggie, dressed as Pippi Longstocking, carries a pile of books.



But it's only time diminished,
not her passion for the part,
So she manages, between her
guests, amazing works of art.

She's Manuela, that's her first name,
then Pentangelo comes last,
And she's illustrated oh so many
stories in the past,

And she's only getting better,
as you'll notice if you look
At the work she's now producing
for our very latest Booke ...

** Note: she'll voice a strong opinion
when she reckons that I'm wrong,
And although we disagree at times
we're not opposed for long.



About the Website Name


In Sascha Martin's laboratory, Sascha and his friend Luca work at a bench while Mary-Alice looks down on them from the stairs. Colour sketch for Sascha Martin's Pitchy Witch.

Kids book, followed by an e, dot com
is not the way to spell it,
But something has to set the
site apart, and so I’ll tell it

Every author needs a website,
every website needs a name
I was searching for a
poetry-related one to claim



Another Pleistocene blowfly, looking annoyed, from the kids book Sascha Martin's Time Machine.


Teacher Mr Jack, dressed in pirate costume for the school book parade. Detail from Sascha Martin's Superball.

But the website naming speculators
greedy with their touch
Had abducted any website name I
thought of, pretty much ...

Yet they hadn't taken Kidsbooke,
though I can't imagine why,
So I grabbed the name as title
of my website, on the fly ...

Thinking how they spelt when
people wrote in verses all the time,
And they understood the meaning
of a truly perfect rhyme.



About the Website Design

Four children crane their necks to watch Sascha Martin's Rocket-Ship disappearing into the sky. Scene from the first book in the Sascha Martin series for kids.


Well you know about the rhyming,
and the website and the art ...
Now, in all the occupations
whereupon I've taken part

As a teacher, writer, postal
worker, public servant, too
Often tired, now retired
though the last is very new


Sascha Martin's teacher and two classmates cry out in fear as prehistoric megafauna begin to invade their classroom.

A designer I have never been -
you'll see in my design;
All that works is down to SBI! ...
The flaws are only mine



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