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Laurel Remington

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Laurel Remington

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July 2012


Hi! Welcome to the world of The Secret Cooking Club and Confetti & Cake - books about food, fun, and friendship for 9-12 year old readers. Perfect for young fans of The Great British Bake-off.
Winner of the Times /Chicken House Children's Fiction Competition 2015.

I love to hear from my readers, so please let me know what you think of the book by leaving a review. And if it inspires you to do any cooking or baking - or just to try something new - do get in touch via my website: www.laurelremington.com.

Happy reading and baking!
Laurel Remington
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Popular Answered Questions

Laurel Remington Dear Abby,

Thank you for the question and for your interest in my books. I get my inspiration from lots of different sources, but often times an entir…more
Dear Abby,

Thank you for the question and for your interest in my books. I get my inspiration from lots of different sources, but often times an entire book will start out with just one simple idea, image, or character voice. With The Secret Cooking Club, I knew that I wanted to write about a secret club of some kind, but I had originally thought about a book club. I got the idea for a cooking club when baking with my two daughters, because cooking and baking is something that can be shared, and that my kids really enjoy. I also had been reading a lot of parenting and pregnancy blogs at the time, as I was expecting my third child. (In fact, it was kind of hard to write about food for a few months when I first started writing the book as I was feeling really sick!) I found the blogs interesting and entertaining, but there were some blogs out there that I pitied the child who might someday read what his mother wrote about him as a baby, or toddler, and be embarrassed. I then came up with Scarlett’s situation, and could hear her ‘voice’ very clearly in my head. I wrote a simple outline, and went from there.

It’s very exciting as a writer to have an idea that is strong enough eventually to become a book. When I first started writing, about twelve years ago now, I used to just get stuck in without taking care to make sure I actually had a plot. Sometimes, I did, and sometimes I didn’t. I have a lot of unpublished drafts on my computer of many different stories and ideas.
I truly believe, however, that no idea is ever really ‘wasted’ and some of them I definitely intend to come back to at some point.

Nowadays, with tighter deadlines and expectations, I use a five step process to make sure that the ideas and inspirations are enough to work with:
1. Is there a concept with a hook?
2. Is there a character with a goal?
3. Is there are strong sense of time and place?
4. Is there are mounting conflict with something important at stake?
5. Is there a theme with a heart?

I hope that the answer to these questions are ‘yes’ and that I will continue to be able to come up with ideas for books that children (and adults) will want to read.

My next book, which is going to be published in July 2018. is called The Polka Dot Shop. It’s the story of girl called Andy who tries to transform her mum’s down market vintage clothing shop into something fabulous. She experiences first love, learns to believe in herself, and discovers that, while fashion seasons come and go, true friendships last a lifetime. The idea for this new book was inspired by my love of vintage clothing from the 1920’s and also my daughters’ years of playing dressing up.

I really appreciate your asking me this question, and I hope that I’ve given you a worthwhile answer. Thanks very much for your interest and support.
LR(less)
Laurel Remington Some people don't believe in writer's block, and in general, I'm probably one of them. However, I do find that there are two types of difficulties tha…moreSome people don't believe in writer's block, and in general, I'm probably one of them. However, I do find that there are two types of difficulties that can happen in the writing process.

1. The story isn't gripping you enough to make writing it trump all the other 'noise' in your life - social media, kids/work/school/commitments, so it's easy not to make time for it. For me, this can only be overcome by 'writing through it' - doing a word count every day to get the story written. Then once it's written it can hopefully be edited and rewritten into something better. In my view, there's no cure for this kind of 'block' other than getting on with it and writing.

2. You reach an impasse in the story or can't see the way forward. This has happened to me in several of my women's fiction mystery books, which have complex plots and clues that need to be planted without giving too much away. I try to work through this kind of 'block' by going back to the outlining stage and thinking through various permutations and how to get from point A to point C, even if I don't know what point B is yet. I use different techniques for this such as mind-mapping, but I prefer writing synopsis' in different levels of details, and sometimes writing a scene or dialogue right in the synopsis. This sets up milestones that I can write to, and move past a block (hopefully). That said, sometimes I don't know how a specific problem will work itself out until very late in the process. It can be a nail-biting experience, but I think that a book needs to be allowed to 'breathe' and grow organically even if you plot it out in advance. (less)
Average rating: 4.08 · 1,385 ratings · 215 reviews · 6 distinct worksSimilar authors
The Secret Cooking Club

4.10 avg rating — 811 ratings — published 2016 — 15 editions
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The Polka Dot Shop

3.96 avg rating — 246 ratings8 editions
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The Secret Cooking Club 2: ...

3.98 avg rating — 240 ratings — published 2017 — 8 editions
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The Secret Cooking Club: Bl...

4.50 avg rating — 88 ratings
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Broken Strings

0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings2 editions
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Confetti & Cake

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Quotes by Laurel Remington  (?)
Quotes are added by the Goodreads community and are not verified by Goodreads. (Learn more)

“cashpoint.”
Laurel Remington, The Secret Cooking Club: Blogs & Bakes

“Aunt Hilda,’ Violet”
Laurel Remington, The Secret Cooking Club

“Memory's images, once they are fixed in words, are erased," Polo said. "Perhaps I am afraid of losing Venice all at once, if I speak of it, or perhaps, speaking of other cities, I have already lost it, little by little.”
Italo Calvino, Invisible Cities

“To bait fish withal: if it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me, and hindered me half a million; laughed at my losses,
mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies; and what's his reason?
I am a Jew.
Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs,dimensions, senses, affections, passions?
Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means,
warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is?
If you prick us, do we not bleed?
If you tickle us, do we not laugh?
If you poison us, do we not die?
And if you wrong us, shall we not
revenge?
If we are like you in the rest, we will
resemble you in that.
If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge.
If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example?
Why, revenge.
The villany you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I
will better the instruction.”
William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice

“I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking. Recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. Some day, all this will have to be developed, carefully printed, fixed.”
Christopher Isherwood, Goodbye to Berlin

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