Holly Valero: Children's Book Author and Illustrator

Meet the author...

Hi, I'm Holly. I'm a web and graphic designer by day, but I've spent a lifetime drawing and writing.

It all began on a 100-acre rundown Pennsylvania farm during the late 1960s – 1970s. Rural electrification had just barely reached our area. There were no street lights – or street signs – for the first few years. Our  telephone was a party line shared with over half a dozen neighbors.

But that lack of technology meant our night skies were blanketed by millions of stars – a daily dose of magic  from the Milky Way that would never be duplicated once I left.  From summer fields blinking with thousands of fire flies to autumn's fiery tree tops of hickory, box-elder and sugar maples stretching as far as the eye could see. I spent my childhood catching crawdads, chasing sheep – and picking wild strawberries, raspberries and blackberries for my mother to turn into jams and jellies. 

The farm became home to dozens of barn cats, a small flock of sheep, and many crazy chickens. For over a dozen years, the family baled hay, raised critters, grew our own food, and tried to keep the sheep from escaping – with minimal success. We did everything from tapping our own maple trees for maple syrup, to growing fields of sunflowers.

Mouse and Elephant live in a rural setting very similar to my childhood farm.