Lynne Mowbray | Yamba author Maggie Hutchings has just published her first children’s book, Unicorn! Maggie, has drawn on her 20 years experience as a counsellor working with children and families, to create this heart warming story about being there for the ones you love. “The idea for the book came about, because of working with children who are dealing with difficult situations,” Maggie said. “Unicorn! is about a little girl whose best friend gets sick and she wants to help her through it. She doesn’t know what to do and so she asks her sick little friend to make a wish. The sick little girl asks for a unicorn, which is quite hard to find; so eventually she imagines one. The girls work through it together. No one can see the Unicorn, but them, and it stays with her in hospital until she gets well. “The book is not only aimed to help people through illness; it could be divorce or problems in the household. “Children have this amazing imagination and by using that imagination it can help them to try and come up with their own imaginative solutions for problems, rather than parents solving the problem for them, which tends to happen. “When children have problems, often they need to reach into what they’ve already got, which is this big imagination about solutions and ways to get through difficult things. “The book (Unicorn!), which was released on September 11, is being sold in book shops all over Australia and it’s in libraries as well. “It’s written for age two to six year-olds, although I think that slightly older kids might like to read it as well; it’s certainly had a lot of good feedback so far. “I’ve written around 15 books so far, but this is the first one with a publisher; so now they have a whole pile on their desk,” Maggie said.