Fairy Cake

'Ghostly Goulash' had been very easy to write and the same was true of 'Fairy Cake', which I wrote straight after it.

When you work with the same characters for long enough, they begin to develop a life of their own. You know what they are going to do, or say, in a certain situation without having to think too hard about it. There was a lot less plot to get through in this book, which left more room for Jake and Granny's characters to come through. By the time I finished it, I felt I knew them both well. And I was able to go back through the earlier books and sharpen up their characters. When I first wrote 'Goblin Stew', I made Granny very absent-minded and a bit timid. By the time, I finished this book I knew her to be a lot more determined and resourceful.

The idea of Dewlally being Jake and Granny's 'fairy god-daughter' didn't occur to me until the end of the first draft, when I was thinking how she might sign-off the letter that she writes to Jake. Fairy godmothers are usually very polite and helpful, so it seemed to make sense that a fairy god-daughter should be the exact opposite.

I'm always writing treasure hunts for people to do around my home and other houses, so it was fun to include one in a story. I didn't want to make the riddles too hard as I hoped that many readers would be able to guess the answers and the overall solution before Jake and Granny did. I like the idea of a book having a puzzle element to it and hope to do it again.