Katy Cannon
About Author
Katy Cannon was born in the United Arab Emirates, grew up in North Wales, and now lives in Hertfordshire with her husband and daughter Holly.
She did an English Literature degree at Lancaster University, but soon found out that writing her own stories was much more fun than analyzing other people's. Katy loves animals and baking.
Author link
Interview
THE SWITCH-UP: L.A. EXCHANGE
STRIPES PUBLISHING
JUNE 2020
THE SWITCH-UP: L.A. EXCHANGE is the second 'Switch-Up' book, the first introducing us to two teenage girls who meet at an airport and decide to swap their lives for the summer.
In the follow-up, L.A. EXCHANGE, teenagers Alice and Willa are back, this time on Willa's home turf of Los Angeles in the US, and there are plenty of opportunities for more swaps and for Willa and Alice get to know each other - and themselves - better.
Look out for friendship and romance, fights and forgiveness, and plenty of fun along the way!
Author KATY CANNON tells us more about THE SWITCH-UP: L.A. EXCHANGE:
Q: What was your path into writing for young people?
A: The books I read from the ages of 11 to around 18 were by far the most influential in my life, and I still reread many of them today. I think stories that centre around that time in a person's life - a time of huge change, and of finding out who we are and what matters to us - are hugely important. They're also a lot of fun! So when I started writing, I knew that I wanted to create some stories for this age range.
Q: Can you tell us a bit about your new book, The Switch Up: L.A. Exchange
A: The book is actually the sequel to last year's novel, The Switch Up, in which two girls, Alice and Willa, meet on a plane to London and decide to switch lives for the summer.
This year, they get to meet up again, this time in LA, where Willa is living. The idea is to have a relaxed holiday, sightseeing, visiting the beach, having fun together. Of course, fate (or Willa) has other plans, and its not long before they're switching places again!
Q: Can you describe the two main characters, Alice and Willa?
A: In the book, Alice comments that, if it hadn't been for their summer swap last year, the two of them would never have become friends, because they're total opposites!
Alice is shy, a little introverted, loves reading, is passionate about the environment, and has no interest in things like fashion or trends. She starts the book unhappy at her new school, and hoping that two weeks with Willa in LA will help her find the kind of confidence she had last summer, when she was pretending to be Willa.
Willa, on the other hand, is a born extrovert, passionate about film making, loves clothes and makeup, and starts the book by convincing her school mates to put on a massive flash mob dance so she can film it for her YouTube channel.
Q: What is it like returning to the same characters, who we met in the first book, The Switch Up, rather than starting a story with new characters?
A: It was so much fun! It really was like visiting old friends, and it was so lovely to have the chance to imagine where Willa and Alice were now, and what lessons they still had to learn from each other about life and friendship.
Q: Why did you decide to set this book in Hollywood, LA; have you visited there yourself?
A: In the first book, Willa's mum is living and working in LA (she's an actress), and at the end they talk about Alice going out there to visit, so it followed on very naturally.
I've never actually been lucky enough to visit LA myself, so there was a lot of research involved. But with Willa's love of film, and determination to become a famous director, where else could I set it?!
Q: There is a strong storyline involving environmental campaigning in LA Exchange, why did you decide to introduce this?
A: I think the climate crisis remains one of the biggest issues facing our planet today. When I was writing the book, young people across the globe were standing up and shouting to be heard on the subject and I think, since the climate crisis will affect their futures so much, it is important to address it.
With Alice's father being a marine biologist, she's naturally very involved in environmental issues, especially concerning our oceans. I wanted to show her passions more in this book, to balance out Willa's passion for film.
Q: Both your characters develop in self awareness during their two-week break, was it hard to chart those changes in quite a short period?
A: I think that we can go years not truly seeing ourselves, or being ourselves. Then all it takes is the right moment, or the right person, to bring things into focus.
With Alice and Willa being such opposites, they're really good at showing the other a different point of view, and that always helps with developing self awareness!
Q: In the story, Willa and Alice pretend to be each other; if you were a teenager again, who would have been the person you most wanted to be like?
A: When I was a teenager, I wanted to be more like my much-cooler friends. These days, if I could go back and be a teenager again, I'd want to be more like a lot of the teenagers I meet and hear from today. They definitely seem to have it a lot more together than we ever did!
Q: What have you got planned next for Willa and Alice?
A: Well, Alice's dad is getting married, and they're both bridesmaids, so I'm hoping I'll be able to tell the story of all the wedding swap hijinks!
It might end up as an exclusive short story for subscribers to my newsletter though, so if you want to read it you'll have to make sure you're all signed up.
Q: Where have you been writing during lockdown, and what has been your favourite escape from your desk?
A: I've had both my kids at home during lockdown, so I've been home schooling AND writing, which has been a challenge! Luckily my husband has taken on his fair share of it too, while also working from home, so we've both been taking turns doing a shift in my study as time allows.
I've been working a lot of evenings and early mornings in there, so I've strung fairy lights all around the room to add a little sparkle. I miss escaping to coffee shops and libraries to write, though!
Q: What are you looking forward to doing most once lockdown is over?
A: Hugging my parents. They're two hundred miles away, so I haven't seen them in months, and don't know when I'll be allowed to again. But we've had a family video chat with them and my two brothers almost every single day since the lockdown started, which has helped.
Q: Do you read much fiction for teenagers? Any top recommended reads for this age range?
A: I try to. At the moment, my daughter is eleven, so I'm reading more of the younger teen books to keep up with her reading habits. She's just discovering the Ally Carter books, especially the Gallagher Girls series, which I adore. She's also finally started reading my books, which is exciting!
When I'm reading for me, I love everything by Beth Garrod for funny contemporary reads, and Harriet Reuter Hapgood for slightly older, more emotional stories. I'm a big fan of Sci-Fi and Fantasy novels too, and adored Aurora Rising by Amie Kaufan and Jay Kristoff last year (the sequel is at the top of my TBR pile).
Oh, and for non-fiction I have to give a mention to the brilliant Find Your Girl Squad by Dr Angharad Rudkin and Ruth Fitzgerald. It's wise, funny, and very, very helpful for girls navigating friendships in their tween and early teen years.
I also always recommend The Confidence Code for Girls by Katty Kay and Claire Shipman for tweens and You Got This by Bryony Gordon for teens.
Q: Top tips for using real life for inspiration in your writing?
A: Always ask yourself 'What if?' It's the question that turns any everyday occurrence into a story with possibility.
What if your teacher didn't show up today? Why? What happened to her? Does she need rescuing? Or what if the people moving into that house across the street weren't normal people but shapeshifters? What if you turned right instead of left like usual at the end of the street by the forest, and ended up in the fairy realm? What if you got on that plane and, instead of getting off as you at the other end, swapped lives with another person?
There are story ideas everywhere - especially in newspapers, or online. The trick is to twist them and expand them into adventures. Or books, as most people call them.
THE SWITCH UP
STRIPES PUBLISHING
JUNE 2019
Willa and Alice bump into each other at the airport, each destined for a summer with strangers when they'd rather be someplace else. So when Alice suggests they look so alike they could switch places for the summer, it seems like a great idea. What could go wrong?
THE SWITCH UP is a fun, warm and hopeful novel for 11+ readers about making new friends and accepting change. We asked author KATY CANNON to tell us more.
Q: What gave you the idea to switch two teenage girls' lives for the summer?
A: I've always loved life swap or body swap stories, like Freaky Friday and the Parent Trap, and it was sort of a challenge to myself to try and find a new way to tell that sort of story, in the real world, without magic or crazy inventions.
Q: In The Switch Up, one of the girls has a summer drama course lined up in London, the other heads for a village in Italy - and they swap for the summer. Which would be your summer destination of choice?
A: When I was 14, like Alice and Willa, it would definitely have been London and the drama course. Now, I think I'd probably pick Italy and the chance to laze around reading books all day.
Q: How did their very different personalities - Willa loves fashion and drama, Alice loves books and lists - emerge? Are you more like either of them?
A: In lots of ways they're actually two halves of my own personality, just taken to extremes. There's definitely some of me in each of them. I love books (obviously) and get panicky without a good to do list. But I also love performing - I studied drama for years, and even now I regularly perform with my choir - and while I've never exactly been a fashion addict, I do like clothes shopping...
Q: The story is told in alternating voices, was it hard to switch between them - especially as each character is pretending to be the other?
A: The swapping definitely made it more complicated than any other dual narrative I've ever written! Remembering whose head I was in, at the same time as thinking about who they were pretending to be, took some keeping straight. But I hear their individual voices quite clearly in my head now, so it's actually proving a little easier writing book two.
Q: Did you warm to either of the characters more than the other?
A: I honestly adore them both. I think I feel closer to Alice in lots of ways, because she's maybe more like me now. But I really enjoyed Willa's arc and how she changed over the summer - and she really is a lot of fun to write.
Q: What about planning, as The Switch Up follows two characters in different countries. Are you a planner, or do you like to find out what happens as you write?
A: Oh, I am most definitely a planner! I find I'm more confident in my writing if I'm working from a plan I've really thought out. Of course, things always change during a first draft - and definitely during edits - but that just means updating the plan, adjusting course, and carrying on.
Q: You explore two very different family backgrounds in the novel, was that something you always saw as part of Willa and Alice's stories?
A: I think so. Part of the whole life swap idea is that they both end up in a different world, a different family, one that they wouldn't necessarily even have thought about if they hadn't met on that plane.
Q: As well as exploring how different families work, this novel is also about young people's voices counting - is that a message you want your readers to take away from the novel?
A: Absolutely! It's always been hard for younger people to make older people listen - it's one of the great frustrations of the world! But I do honestly believe that is changing - and that it needs to change. Every voice counts, and your age doesn't mean that what you have to say isn't important. We all need to speak out - and we all need to listen more in turn, too.
Q: Are you planning to revisit Alice and Willa in future books?
A: I am! I'm actually working on book two right now, and having so much fun spending time with Alice and Willa again.
Q: Where is your favourite place to write?
A: Mostly, I write in my study at home. But when I really need to focus in and get down to some serious writing, I often find I do best out of the house (preferably somewhere with no wifi...). I like writing in coffee shops or my local library, but my favourite place of all to write is at the British Museum. I write a thousand words, then reward myself with a visit to one of my favourite exhibitions (or the book shop). Then it's a cup of tea and another thousand words. Repeat until done!
Q: ...And when do you do your best writing?
A: Time wise, I'm definitely a lark. If I need to get extra work done one day, it's far easier for me to get up at 5am and do it before the rest of the house wakes up. If I wait until evening, I'm too drained - of energy and creativity - to do anything much. It takes me three times as long to do thing in the evening than it would in the morning!
Q: Are you planning any escapes this summer, like your latest characters?
A: I have a few escapes coming up this summer actually. Four days in Derbyshire with friends, and a whole week in a Chateau in France with my extended family! Best of all, I'm off to New York for five days next month! I'm so, so excited about it.
Q: What YA fiction have you read recently, and would recommend to our members?
A: I've been on a bit of a sci-fi binge recently, and really loved Aurora Rising and Once and Future. Contemporary-wise, I'm enjoying Happy Girl Lucky, by Holly Smale, and really looking forward to reading Beth Garrod's new book, Take A Chance On Me.
HOW TO WRITE A LOVE STORY
STRIPES PUBLISHING
MAY 2018
In HOW TO WRITE A LOVE STORY, author KATY CANNON explores what are the ingredients of a perfect match - and a bestselling novel!
Tilly's grandmother is a famous romantic writer and Tilly has become indispensable to her, helping her edit drafts and disentangle plot lines. But what does it take to write a bestselling romantic novel? And can you even do that if you've never been in love...?
Here, author KATY CANNON tells us more about her latest novel, HOW TO WRITE A LOVE STORY!
Q: How to Write a Love Story is about a teenager, Tilly, trying to write a romance - while also still trying to experience it. What gave you the idea to write your novel this way?
A: I think the teenage years can sometimes feel like you're constantly pretending to know more than you do - about the world, about yourself, and definitely about love. I know it was that way for me, anyway. And after writing love stories for so many years, I wondered what it would be like to try to do that when your only real knowledge of love was what you'd read in other books.
Q: Are you a fan of romantic fiction?
A: I'm a huge fan of romantic fiction, and have been since I was a teenager myself. In fact, I also write romances and women's fiction, under the penname Sophie Pembroke, so I already knew a lot about the conventions, hooks and tropes involved - which made the research a lot easier!
I love all kinds of romance, from historical to paranormal, but I write contemporary, and I think that's probably my favourite. Plus, I find that most stories have a hint of romance in them, if you look hard enough...
Q: Would you advise young writers, as Tilly is advised, to 'write what you know about'? Do young people, as Tilly's difficulties suggests, have enough experience of the world to be able to write about what they know - especially romance?
A: This is a tricky one because, if I only ever wrote what I knew, I'd have a very limited selection of stories to tell! That said, I think writing from your own experience can be a great way to build up your skills as an author.
But mostly, I'd say to write what fascinates you, and what you can research or imagine thoroughly. You don't have to have been to Ancient Rome to set a book there, but you're going to want to read a lot of history and accounts of people who were there, and study a lot of maps and archaeological digs before you get started. And if you're able to get some experience - say, visiting Roman site in this country, or speaking to an expert in the field - why wouldn't you? It'll make your story stronger, and probably spark all sorts of new ideas.
So basically, it comes down to 'do your research'. And anyone can do that. I think this is especially important if you're telling someone else's story - the story of a person from a different background or religion or whatever. And in those cases, it's really vital to consider if you're the right person to tell that story, or whether there's someone living it right now who could tell it better.
Q: Tilly turns out to be a bit of an unreliable narrator, so how difficult was it to flesh out the others' characters - and Tilly's mistakes - since we see them all through Tilly's perspective?
A: I think that was probably one of the hardest things about writing the book! Tilly sees the world very clearly through her own eyes and mindset - but that isn't always the most accurate or empathetic view. Finding ways to hint to the reader that there was more to the story than Tilly was reading or telling, without giving everything away too early, was definitely a challenge.
Q: Is Tilly's wonderful grandmother - the author Beatrix Frost - based on anyone you know?
A: Yes. There's a lot of my late Grandma Cannon in Bea Frost, especially when it comes to hats and, sadly, dementia. And the close relationship between Tilly and her Gran is definitely based on my own relationship with all my grandparents.
Q: Both Tilly and her grandmother, for different reasons, experience writer's block. How do you get yourself out of that fear of the 'blank page'?
A: Mostly I tend to give myself far too much to do, so I can't afford writer's block or I'll miss deadlines and let people down! But working on multiple projects at once also means that if I'm struggling with one book I can switch to another, so I'm still making progress somewhere. And when I come back to the first one, I tend to be inspired by it all over again.
My other trick, on days when the words really won't come, is to use a timer. I tell myself I only need to write for one minute, and then I can stop. That's always so easy, I set the timer for two minutes. Then five, then ten, then fifteen... and by then, the words are flying.
If all else fails, I go for a walk. I get some of my best ideas when I'm walking.
Q: Tilly's experiences also remind us to be true to ourselves in what we want to achieve. Is that a personal quest for you in your writing?
A: Absolutely. I write a lot of books, between my YA and my romances, but I couldn't do it if I didn't believe in them, and find something to love and something I want to say that matters to me in every book I write. A lot of my YA is about the importance of figuring out your own identity, rather than being what others expect you to be, and about asking for help when you need it. Which is exactly what I needed to hear as a teenager!
Q: Who are your current favourite YA writers?
A: There are so many fantastic authors out there telling stories that matter, it's almost impossible to choose just a few! But I always love anything by Sarah Dessen, and in the UK I adore Non Pratt and Holly Bourne.
Q: There are a lot of tips for aspiring writers through the story, such as keeping a notebook and diary to hand. What are your top tips and did you use any of this advice when you were in your teens?
A: I always had a notebook with me as a child, and a teen, and now! But that's at least partly because I just love notebooks. I also jot down ideas and notes in my phone in the Evernote app. Sometimes these ideas never come to anything, but if ever I'm waiting for a new book to show up, ready to be written, flicking through my notes and memories - paper or electronic - always jumpstarts the process.
My top tip for aspiring writers is always to read more. The best way to get an innate feel for story, dialogue and character is to read great ones. Also, pay attention - to the world around you, the people you meet, the funny things you hear someone say, the headlines, everything. Jot down the ones that resonate with you.
Remember, writing a book is creating a whole world - and the research you need to do for that is around you every day. Even most fantasy novels steal from the real world in some ways.
Q: Where do you write and how does your writing day go? What are you writing now?
A: Most days, I write in my study at home - which is the converted garage, and also the spare room, so I share the space with a lot of other stuff! I like to write out and about too - in coffee shops, museums, libraries, the garden... anywhere!
I aim to get the bulk of my writing done in the mornings, leaving my afternoons free for editing, proofreading, admin, accounts, website updates, blog posts, emails, promo... all the other stuff that makes up the job of a writer these days.
Q: Describe your dream 'writer's shed'?
A: Just somewhere I didn't have to share space with the hoover! Um, I'd love a nice, big, old desk. Lots of bookshelves, of course. A comfy armchair to read in. A fantastic view out of the window - maybe of the sea. Plenty of space for all my files and notebooks (there are a lot). My favourite pictures and photos on the wall. And close to my house so my family can come and hang out with me whenever they wanted!
Q: What are your favourite escapes from writing?
A: I think, in some ways, a writer is always writing. There's always a story playing in my head, or a new idea taking shape. But when I'm not physically at my desk working, I like to read (of course), spend time with friends, catch up on my favourite TV shows... And I love to get out with my family, visiting castles or other historic places. And the seaside! The seaside is my absolute favourite.
AND THEN WE RAN
STRIPES PUBLISHING
APRIL 2017
In this book about grief, families and being oneself, author KATY CANNON explores what happens when two teenagers, Megan and Elliott, try to escape their small town lives.
Lizzie, Megan's perfect older sister, died in an accident just over a year ago. While Megan is grieving for her sister, her parents seem to want her to become another 'Lizzie'.
Elliott, meanwhile, is trying to cope with an absent father who was imprisoned for defrauding many of the people in their home town. He can see no way out of the town, nor a future he wants.
Then Lizzie discovers a possible way out for them both, but just how much are they willing to sacrifice to get there?
We asked author KATY CANNON to tell us more about her latest book, AND THEN WE RAN (Stripes Publishing):
Q: Your new novel sees two teenagers eloping to Gretna Green - but what gave you the idea for this?
A: I woke up from a dream with the idea of two teenaged friends running away to Gretna Green in my head - and I ignored it for at least a year until I went back through my files and I saw it and thought, this could be fun.
I had to think carefully about they whys and wherefores. I knew I wanted the teenagers to be just friends, so then I had to work out what kind of people they needed to be to find themselves in this situation.
Q: The two main characters, Megan and Elliott, narrate the story - why did you decide to write it like this?
A: It was partly because Megan is such a strong character, she would take over the novel and it would have been hard to get Elliott's point of view because she just doesn't think about others.
Having two narrators made it easier to get inside Elliott's head. He doesn't say very much so when he does speak, we know it matters - unlike Megan who talks all the time but not about anything important.
Q: How did their characters develop?
A: I tend to think about characters very early on in the process. Megan came first, I wanted a heroine who decided what she wanted and then went after it, regardless, so she was a strong force from the beginning. Then I needed someone who would agree to her plans and Elliott developed from that. When I was 14 to 16 years old, my best friend was a boy called Andy and I had two teenage brothers, so I knew about teenaged boys and I used that to help develop Elliott's character.
Q: Did you draw inspiration for their story from your own teenage years?
A: I think that I have for this book, more than any other I have written. I went back to my teenage diaries again and again to see how I felt then and how things were. At that age you feel things very keenly and everyone comes with baggage.
I hope that most teens won't go to the extreme that Megan and Elliott chose to escape their current situation but, by exploring my characters' back stories, I hope the reader can understand the lengths they were willing to go to, to escape. I think the feelings they go through are universal - everyone has lost someone or felt betrayed at some point in their lives, even if you are fine now.
Q: In the story, Megan's parents feel they need to push her in a certain direction. Do you think that many teenagers struggle with their parents' expectations?
A: I think being a teenager is impossibly hard, I certainly felt it and I had the most supportive parents in the world. Even so, I felt there was this huge sense of expectation for me to be the person people wanted me to be. Looking back, nobody expected that of me, I just thought they did.
In the story, Megan's parents are being very demanding of her and I think they are wrong to do that - but by the end they do support her after they have talked it through because they just want Megan to be happy.
Q: Megan's passion is photography, why did you decide to give her this talent?
A: I think that because she is so impulsive and jumps into things without thinking about it first, I liked her having one thing that meant the world would stop for a moment, and it's the one time that she focuses on just one thing.
Megan begins by photographing landscapes but, as she learns to understand people better, she learns to take portraits of people as she gets to know them.
Q: The story is set in a small Welsh town - is that also drawn from your teenaged years?
A: I grew up in a large town in north Wales but I have a large and sprawling family so there was always someone who knew what I was getting up to.... I remember holding a lit cigarette for a friend who went into a shop and that was the exact moment half my family walked past. So even though I have never smoked a cigarette in my life, that's what they thought I was doing.
Q: Much of the story is focused on whether or not Megan and Elliott will leave the town so how did you go about planning the actual road trip?
A: There were a lot of things I had to factor in like the 30 day waiting period before you can get married in Gretna Green and there was also Christmas to fit in - so there was a lot of wrangling around the timelines.
As for the road trip itself, I had already done quite a bit of investigating into the practicalities because we were once invited to a wedding at Gretna Green - but couldn't get there because we were on holiday at Pembrokeshire. Going to the wedding would have taken four days out of our holiday because where we were was so inaccessible. So I knew how hard it would be for Megan and Elliott to get out of that area and to travel to Gretna Green, because I had already had a go at planning it!
Q: Do you plan to revisit Megan and Elliott to find out what happens to them?
A: On one hand I would love to - but I already have another idea for a book that I want to write. The next one will be a wildly romantic story - there isn't a great deal of romance in And Then We Ran, so it will be good to write something different.
Q: What advice would you give to your teenage self about becoming a writer?
A: I think I would advise my younger self to get help with writing sooner than I did. I knew that writing was something I wanted to do but I didn't want to show people what I had written and I didn't take advantage of writing groups.
There are so many organisations and conferences and seminars available now on creative writing and I think if I had shared my writing earlier, I would have improved more quickly.
Q: Can you explain how writers work with their editor and their agent?
A: I'm very lucky with my editor and agent and we work closely on my stories. I work with my agent to hammer out ideas for stories and to decide what is working and what isn't, and then I go to my editor to develop those ideas.
I like getting a lot of feedback now and having people's input and thoughts for what I am writing - unlike when I was younger. Although I still feel completely terrified when I'm sending off the finished book for my editor to read!
SECRETS, SCHEMES & SEWING MACHINES
PUBLISHED BY STRIPES
FEBRUARY 2015
SECRETS, SCHEMES & SEWING MACHINES, the companion novel to Katy Cannon's Love, Lies and Lemon Pies, returns to the same group of friends we met previously but this time the focus is on Grace, and on sewing rather than baking.
Grace expects to be given the starring role in the school play, Much Ado About Nothing, but instead of starring as Beatrice, she is put in charge of costumes. She also has to deal with the unknown new boy, Connor, who happens to be stage manager - and the sparks begin to fly...
This is a thoroughly entertaining romantic story that takes its cue from the banter and plot twists of Much Ado About Nothing. There is also a variety of achieveable sewing projects scattered through the chapters for readers to tackle.
We asked author KATY CANNON to tell us what inspires her to write for teenaged readers, and to talk about her latest novel.
Q: When did you decide you wanted to be an author?
A: When I was 11 I had to go to hospital to have my appendix out and I didn't know what to do with myself. I started reading books like The Chalet Girls and Hitch Hikers' Guide to the Galaxy and I've never stopped reading or writing since.
I come from a family of readers and writers. One of my cousins writes for the BBC and for stage, another is an author and another is an editor. When we were kids we all used to go on holidays together to places that were always in the middle of nowhere and we would swap books with each other. So I'd already decided that I'd do something in writing, before I started to write books.
When I left university I had a fulltime job in events and organising medical conferences which took me all over the world, I spent a lot of time at airports with not much to do. I worked long hours, 9am to 6pm every day plus a lot of evenings and I spent weekends travelling, but I knew I wanted to write so I'd get up and write an hour before work or during my lunch break. My very supportive husband even built me my first computer to write on, back in 2001.
Q: How hard was it to get your first book published?
A: I wrote a lot but couldn't get it published. I knew I still had a lot to learn about writing so I read a lot of books about it. I write romances for adults but I always wanted to write for younger readers. I sent a couple of books out but they were rejected, then I started to get interest in the next book but it was a paranormal title and when the paranormal bubble burst, it was past its time.
I was thrilled when Love, Lies and Lemon Pies was picked up by Stripes. While I waited for that to be published, I started writing the Pooch Parlour books.
Q: How did you decide to have themes for each book - baking in the first and sewing in the second?
A: When I started thinking about what to write I first came up with this group of characters that I wanted to write about.
I decided that the theme would be baking for the first book, Loves, Lies and Lemon Pies, when I was talking with my agent about what to write next - we were eating cake at the time. But there's only so much you can write about baking competitions and when it came to the second book, I wanted it to be a very different book from the first, but with the same feel and the same group of friends.
I decided the book would be about Grace, who hadn't been a huge character in book one and who wasn't very nice. I didn't want it to be a book about drama though, I wanted it to involve something more crafty, so I decided on sewing.
Q: Like your earlier book that has a lot of baking ideas, Secrets, Schemes & Sewing Machines suggests lots of ideas for sewing. Do you know a lot about sewing?
A: I bake regularly so I didn't have any problem writing around that in the first book. But I haven't done any sewing since I was a child and I decided that, if Grace has to learn to do it in this book, I can learn alongside her. My agent is a fantastic sewer and showed up with a book about sewing on our way to sign the book deal for Love, Lies and Lemon Pies!
I was learning to sew as I went along so the projects I have included as you read through the book were the projects I was doing as I wrote the book. I wanted to include sewing projects that people with a range of abilities could do and I wanted there to be a progression and for them to be fun to make and to be things that people might want to make for themselves. The projects also needed to tie into the text in some way.
The hardest project to make in the book was the drop-waisted T-shirt dress. I made that for my daughter who was five or six at the time and as she wore the dresses all summer in the end, they were probably okay but I did find them very fiddly.
Q: What is the appeal of sewing to teenagers?
A: You can easily and cheaply buy all your own clothes these days but I love the individuality of homemade clothes and being able to make something that is totally yours and that is unique. As a teenager you want to fit in but you also want something that expresses who you are so being able to make a bag for books that no-one else has, that says, 'it's mine and I made it', is great.
I have made quite a few book bags for my daughter, one using a Russian Doll fabric that cost very little. They take no time to sew and you can't buy a bag like that as cheaply. So you have the joy of paying for your hobby but knowing you'll get something out of it at the end.
Q: Why did you choose Much Ado About Nothing as the school play for this story?
A: I wanted the book to be very different from the earlier book about Lottie and Mac and it needed a very different character who would be forced to take stock of her life so when it came to choosing the play, it had to be that one.
I've never performed in Much Ado About Nothing but it is my favourite Shakespeare play. I love the banter and the relationships between Benedick and Beatrice and I love the idea that the one person who is ideal for you is the one person you can't stand. These themes are reflected in the characters' off-stage lives, too.
There's a lot of drama in my family, my cousins have joined drama groups and one of them is a musical director. I did a lot of drama at school and then theatre studies at A level and when I was at university I did radio drama. I even went to work for my cousin as a production assistant on Cool Hand Luke, which was lots of fun. I saw what goes on backstage and worked with wardrobe which gave me the confidence that I could tackle it in this book.
Q: Were there any parts of the book you found harder to write?
A: Considering I also write romance novels for adults for a living, I found the romance part of the relationship between Grace and Connor very hard to write. I realised in my final drafts that I had written so much about the other things they do that I had forgotten about the romance side of it. I had to go back through the novel to make that feel real and to make sure it made sense on both sides, because you only really see things through Grace's eyes, but what is Connor going through? Understanding both sides of the story wasn't easy.
Q: How does your writing day go?
A: I write from 9am to 3pm and in the evening I do my edits and contracts. If I'm being really pushed to finish something, I'll get up at 5am to work.
When I'm not working I bake with my daughter, and I'm sewing through the book again so I can blog it and do photographs for the website. I did the same for Love, Lies and Lemon Pies. The projects take a lot of work because you have to get people to test each one out, check the timings etc. It's a much bigger undertaking than I'd expected.
Q: Can you give us your top tip for beginning a story?
A: When I write a book, I think 'what if?' about any situation. Character is always the heart of my story and when I begin a story, I always need to think what they want most in the world, why they can't have it and what do they need to do to get it?
The Switch Up: L. A. Exchange
The Switch Up
How to Write a Love Story
And Then We Ran
Secrets, Schemes and Sewing Machines
