Forest Xiao

A year that gave birth to my first book baby! Filling everyday with full of cuteness, cheekiness, parenting chaos and never ending food mess, in all its mundane glory. The wildness will surely continue ➡️

You know you love it already. Babies! Beautiful babies! These are the bonniest little babies in all the land and they come from the wondrous mind of @forestxiaodraws . She knows babies. She has them. She was one. And we're so very happy that SEVEN BABIES was featured in the @_thebookseller 's Buyer’s Guide Spring/Summer 2025 edition published at the weekend. 👶🏻👶🏼👶🏽👶🏾👶🏿👶🏻👶🏻: "Xiao’s delightful debut, exploring the everyday chaos that comes with having a baby in your life, has a similar look (and as much warmth) as Helen Oxenbury’s A First Book for Babies series.” Yay for SEVEN BABIES and for Forest's fancy jumper! 🌼

Fearless Seven Babies in Bologna 🥹 with the fantastic Walker guardians And the 8th one that kept me in London 🐣

Happy news today! @klausfluggeprize 🫶🏻 Thank you for bringing these chubby cheeks to the world! @deemaronie @mawiatunney @walkerpicturebooks @justinekatesmith @csacbi Swipe right for a celebrating baby dance!

The Dad Book has landed on the earth! So lovely to meet Carol and Ruth from @everybody.reads and let me paint a dad joke on their window. It’s not too early to get a Father’s Day present 😉 for all new dad, dad to be, seasoned dad and matured grandad, EVERY DAD! 🕺💁🏽‍♂️👨🏼‍🎨👨🏻‍⚖️🥷🏻🎅🏽🙋🏾‍♂️🙆🏻‍♂️🕴🏻 @hachettechildrens #dadjokes

A great party celebrating all the debut picturebooks in the ‘hottest’ room in Piccadilly 🤪 last week! @klausfluggeprize Always a joy to see @csacbi pals Couldn’t get enough from @rbiddulph and @emmafarrarons sharing! 10 minutes are too short!

Congratulations to @forestxiaodraws on being shortlisted for the Indie Book Awards 2026. Whoo hoo! We couldn't love these lovely round babies any MORE! And we couldn't love Forest any more either. She was in the Walker Books office just last week talking about the next picture book adventure for her seven babies, and cover designs. (Look closely: there may be shopping involved. 👀🥦🫛🫜🛒) We could keep her in the office all day, every day, it's such a joy. ❤️ Go forth, little babies, spread joy! 👶🏻👶🏼👶🏻👶🏻👶🏽👶🏾

💛 Cover Reveal 💛 Celebrate the everyday magic of fatherhood with The Dad Book! AD Delightfully relatable, funny, heartfelt, and packed full of love, The Dad Book perfectly captures the wonder, confusion and sleepiness that comes with being a new parent. As a dad to three boys, that mix of joy, chaos and tiredness definitely sounds familiar. I love books that celebrate those small, everyday moments of being a dad and this one feels like it would make a lovely read to share with the boys! Written and illustrated by @forestxiaodraws , The Dad Book is out on April 23rd.

#NewIllustrationOfTheDay by Forest Xiao, from Seven Babies (Walker Books), one of the 19 picturebooks on the Klaus Flugge Prize longlist for a new illustrator, announced today. (Nine more of the longlist have already featured in my #NewIllustrationOfTheDay.) @walkerpicturebooks @klausfluggeprize @forestxiaodraws /longlist-2026/

One Thursday morning, a box of babies arrived at this door... We are delighted to share the news that SEVEN BABIES by Forest Xiao ( @forestxiaodraws ) has been longlisted for the prestigious Klaus Flugge Prize! Congratulations, Forest! SEVEN BABIES is out now from @walkerbooksuk . 👶 🍼 👶 The perfect gift for any new parent who will quickly understand that one baby is as busy and chaotic as having seven! Babies need a lot of feeding, changing, entertaining, bathing ... and don’t forget ALL that laundry. But, luckily, seven babies means ... seven times the love! With a simple read-aloud text and hilarious pictures with a sweet ladybird family to search and find throughout, Seven Babies is also a cosy, funny bedtime read - ideal for getting little ones into books for the first time. “Joyous […] The babies’ expressive round faces recall Helen Oxenbury ’s drawings, but Xiao’s art has a zingier colour palette and a wildness of its own. It’s one of the cutest, and perhaps best, picture book portrayals of new parenthood that I’ve ever read – the exhausting babies barrel across each page, pulling books from shelves, chewing the rug and escaping the bath.” - The Observer “A wonderfully joyful picture book for introducing children to the concept of having a sibling.” - Waterstones

How to Catch An Idea paperback is out in the wild! 🍏🥑🍒🫐🍌🍐🥕🌽🌶️ Catch it like Ora!@hachettechildrens @hachettechildrens_pr

So yummy. Here is a little sneaky peek from @forestxiaodraws 's new baby board book YUMMY YUMMY. We. Are. Obsessed. And we can't BELIEVE we have to wait until May for you to see this little beauty on the bookshelves! But for now, we hope this brightens your day! 🌞