Noriko Matsubara is a children's book author & illustrator born in Japan and Bocchi and Pocchi : A Tale of Two Socks is her first picture book. The inspiration for the story came from her childhood as she would watch her grandmother regularly darning socks and wondering what might happen to them.

Much of her childhood was spent daydreaming about imaginary worlds and doodling in notebooks. While art was her passion, she became a Japanese language teacher and taught Japanese in Lebanon, Canada and the UK. A consequence of her travels was her decision to follow her passion, and she went on to study visual arts at Memorial University of Newfoundland in Canada and completed a MA in Fine Art at Central St Martin’s College of Art and Design in the UK. She currently lives in Consett, County Durham with her husband and two children.
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Visit her NorikoArt website to find out more about Noriko's artwork.