NORWALK, Conn. — (AP) — Author and illustrator Ian Woodward Falconer, known for his “Olivia” book series for children, has died.
Falconer’s lawyer and agent Conrad M. Rippy said Falconer died Tuesday of natural causes while with family in Norwalk, Connecticut. He was 63.
Falconer’s “Olivia” books featured a clever piglet with a great imagination named Olivia, a character he developed for his young niece in 1996. Family members and friends encouraged him to keep working on the character.
He turned down publishers who wanted the text be written by an outside author. “I am afraid my vanity wouldn’t allow me to relegate myself to ‘illustrated by,’” he said. “I also thought my instincts about the story were, if unpolished, right, and had happened organically with the pictures.”
The first book in the series, called “Olivia,” was published in 2000. It stayed on the…
