NOVELIST Esther Freud will be making a guest appearance at Idea Store Canary Wharf on this evening as part of Tower Hamlets council’s free Writeidea literary festival.

Esther, who has written several novels with her latest offering Lucky Break due out next April, said she is looking forward to meeting fans and talking about her work.

Esther, who trained as an actress prior to being a full time author, started writing whilst at drama school. She began to develop a real love for writing and after a stint as an actress gave it up to concentrate on writing full time.

She said: “I’ve always loved telling stories and being an actor was one way of doing that but I discovered that writing was what I enjoyed most. I remember being completely immersed and absorbed in my writing whilst working on Hideous Kinky.”

Hideous Kinky, a semi autobiographical novel, is about Esther’s childhood of growing up in Morocco.

The debut was met by critical and commercial success and later made into a film of the same name staring Kate Winslet.

Esther said: “I had no idea when I was writing Hideous Kinky, that it would take off as it did. You never really think of your work being made it into a film. I was very flattered by the success but that wasn’t why I set out to be a writer.”

The writer who is married to the actor David Morrissey and is the great grand daughter of Sigmund Freud, daughter of painter Lucian Freud and sister of fashion designer Bella Freud, shrugs off her starry connections and is more interested in finding a satisfying short story to read.

She said: “At the moment I am really enjoying Tobias Wolff and Ann Enright’s work. It’s wonderful when you stumble across a piece of work that just takes your breath away and the style is fascinating. I hope to be able to pass on some of my enthusiasm when I come to the Writeidea Festival.”

Esther Freud will be at Idea Store Canary Wharf tonight at 7pm.