By Maureen Tai, 22 April 2024

In this charming, engaging and insightful chapter book for younger readers (ages 6-9), we meet Tola, a little Nigerian girl with a big heart. She lives in Lagos with her siblings, Moji, who is very clever, and Dapo, who is very hard-working, and with her grandmother, who is very loving but also very strict. The family relies on Dapo’s earnings as a mechanic for all their necessities, yet Tola finds pleasure in many things – eating, learning, doing her homework, and being with her family. One day, Tola’s life is turned upside down as the pandemic spreads to Africa, and the government imposes a lockdown, forcing everyone to stay at home. As their food and funds dwindle, Tola decides that she needs to do something to help her family. Using her newly-learned maths skills, Tola gets tough (hence the title) and emerges triumphant at a the satisfying end of the story. What I love about this chapter book (and her many others) is that Atinuke doesn’t shy away from describing – in age-appropriate prose – the yawning chasm between the working class poor and the BMW-driving, private-helicopter-flying rich, nor does she gloss over the hardships endured by the poor and the elderly. Her characters are not merely two sides of a coin, either virtuous heroes or blameworthy caricatures. Instead, Atinuke describes interesting and complicated individuals in rich and realistic relationships, and, through the kind, plucky and clever Tola, shines a light on the threads of humanity that bind us all – rich or poor, young or old, friend or stranger – together. Do check out the other books in her Too Small Tola series, and follow it up with a foray into her Anna Hibiscus and The No.1 Car Spotter series of chapter books as well. You won’t regret it.

Ages 6 and up.