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Esther Freud

Esther Freud was born in London in 1963. As a young child she travelled through Morocco with her mother and sister, returning to England aged six where she attended a Rudolf Steiner school in Sussex.

In 1979 she moved to London to study Drama, going on to work as an actress, both in theatre and television, and forming her own company with fellow actress/writer Kitty Aldridge - The Norfolk Broads.

Her first novel Hideous Kinky, was published in 1992 and was shortlisted for the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and made into a film starring Kate Winslet. In 1993, after the publication of her second novel, Peerless Flats, she was named by Granta as one of the Best of Young Novelists under 40.

She has since written seven novels, including The Sea House, Love Falls and Lucky Break. She also writes stories, articles and travel pieces for newspapers and magazines, and teaches creative writing, in her own local group and at the Faber Academy.

Her most recent book, Mr Mac and Me, was published in September 2014. She lives in London with her husband, the actor David Morrissey, and their three children.


“... a discovery you make yourself is worth twenty thousand things that you are taught, even if it is a discovery that everyone else has made.”
Esther Freud
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“Trust your reader. Not everything needs to be explained. If you really know something, and breathe life into it, they'll know it too.”
Esther Freud
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