(Photo: @NicoleMapleCoenen, facebook.com)

Wood chopping and a book — can you imagine putting these two things together in a sentence and making it make sense?

Meet Nicole Coenen, a B.C. woman who’s internet famous for chopping wood on TikTok — and now she’s written a book about it. Her chops, literally! 

Nicole lives on Bowen Island, and during the early pandemic days, she started posting videos of herself splitting logs. Sometimes she’s in flannel, sometimes in glitter, sometimes in both. It wasn’t just about the chopping — people kept watching because of the calm, the confidence, and how real she was about everything from technique to mental health.

Her book is called Axe in Hand: A Woodchopper’s Guide to Blades, Wood, and Fire. It came out earlier this month (April 15, 2025) and mixes how-to advice with personal stories. It’s got chapters on choosing axes, chopping safely, restoring old blades, and building fires. But just like her videos, the book goes deeper.

As Nicole puts it:

“It’s a guide to blades, wood, and fire. For those who are experienced and those who are curious.”

She doesn’t pretend to be a wilderness survivalist expert or some kind of pro woodsman. Instead, she shows people how to find strength in the act — and how fire can mean connection, healing, and even joy. 

In interviews, she’s opened up about growing up in suburban Ontario and struggling with how she was “allowed” to be seen.

“I always actually tried to make myself seem weaker than I was,” she said. “And I wanted to be stronger, but I didn’t think that that was really allowed.”

Now she’s got more than five million followers across platforms — and a book that might just inspire you to pick up an axe, or at least think about where your own fire comes from.


(Photo: Quarto, https://www.quarto.com/)

Axe in Hand is out now.

Grab it at a local bookstore, support a BC writer, and maybe gift it to someone who needs a little spark this season.

More information: https://www.quarto.com/books/9780760392676/axe-in-hand