Laurine Croasdale
About Surf School and Surf Sisters
Laurine Croasdale moved to Australia from England at seven. She attended Narrabeen Girls High School and spent all times in between at North Narrabeen beach. It was the 70s – the international surfing circuit was gearing up, kombis filled the ca r park, the air was thick with coconut oil, Simon Anderson and Terry Fitzgerald were kings of the surf, and hamburgers were still made with 100% beef.
Around 17 Laurine left the beaches to go travelling. She worked in the ski fields, hitch hiked around New Zealand then lived in Perth, Paris and London for a three year stretch in each.
On returning to Australia she noticed that a lot of girls were now surfing, something that wasn't happening in the 70s, and as those numbers increased over the years she decided to combine her interest in the sport with her childhood experiences, and in particular, the strong friendships she had during those years.
Biography
Laurine Croasdale has worked as an editor, packager, consultant and writer for the book industry. She has published fiction, non-fiction for children and teenagers as well as scripts for Hi 5. Surf Sisters is her 5th novel for the upper primary/YA age group. Her books are primarily about friendships and relationships and tend to be set around the area where she grew up and currently lives.
Talks
Laurine can present a variety of talks for different age groups. She can talk about the process of creating a book starting with her own illustrations through to the finished product; discuss the writing process by showing segments from Hi5 and how ideas are developed (along with the original protype for Jup Jup); show photos of raging bushfires in the street where she grew up to illustrate how she came to write about the 1994 bushfires that devastated Sydney; and talk about the professional surfing circuit where she spent time researching her books Surf School and Surf Sisters. Ripcurl has also provided a surfing film to show and Curl magazine has offered a free magazine subscription and giveaways to schools.
The focus is on interaction with the kids, and after ten years reviewing books, comparing notes on great reads! Each talk is tailored for the group with plenty of time for questions and discussion.
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