![\"Emma](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/5140824_2_articleinline_VID_20250919_154909_exported_54970_4.jpg\" "\\"Emma")
Emma enjoys indulging in her favourite sport of surfing at Garrettstown and Inch beaches in Cork<\/p>\nA French writer visits Cork to work on a biography of an elderly local woman who has retired from a glorious culinary career in Paris.<\/p>\n
That is the theme of this year\u2019s Summer Soap, now in its 11th year, which runs over ten parts in The Echo, starting in print on Monday, July 6, and running until July 17. It will also appear daily online at EchoLive.ie<\/p>\n
The story has been chosen from entries sent in by the students on the MA in creative writing programme at UCC.<\/p>\n
Entitled The Lost Recipe, it was written by Emma Tirlot. Her protagonist Claire, the Gallic writer, is in Cork to write the life story of Margaret, who had a successful cookery career in the French capital.<\/p>\n
During her time in Cork, Claire has a romance with a (fictional) UCC professor, and she begins a search for a long-lost recipe for currant buns that Margaret remembers from her youth.<\/p>\n
Emma herself is French. She had fun writing the soap which combines mystery with romance.<\/p>\n
However, the romantic subplot is not a big deal, more of a fleeting encounter between a UCC history professor and Claire.<\/p>\n
What sparked this story was Emma\u2019s curiosity about the history of Cork while she was studying at UCC.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the city I\u2019ve been living in since September. The story came to me when I was researching the history of Cork,\u201d explains Emma.<\/p>\n
\n \u201cI definitely wanted to write something light-hearted. I\u2019m also bringing a little bit of my experience to the story with the French character. It\u2019s through Claire\u2019s eyes that the story is told. She is a cookery influencer. She has come to Cork to interview the elderly Margaret who was a renowned chef in Paris. She is not based on anyone real.\u201d\n <\/p>\n
Claire first meets the UCC professor when she hears that he might have some information about the currant bun recipe.<\/p>\n
So immersed was the author in her writing project that she went to the trouble of trying out a number of recipes for currant buns, and will publish her favourite one as part of the last chapter of the soap.<\/p>\n
Emma rather likes the currant buns that she has eaten in Cork caf\u00e9s.<\/p>\n
Margaret, who is in her eighties, is very cranky initially. \u201cShe doesn\u2019t want a biography written about her. But the publishers were able to convince her to be interviewed by Claire. By the end of the project, Claire and Margaret have become good friends.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe romantic element involving the professor is very light, just a fun element that I wanted to add to the story. It brings everything together for a satisfying ending.\u201d<\/p>\n
You could say that Emma is embarking on a satisfying career after the trauma of all her plans collapsing in America. She studied international development at Georgia Southern University, and interned in Washington DC for a year but was unable to secure a work visa when the internship came to an end.<\/p>\n
\u201cI thought I was going to get a job in the US and build a career there but it just didn\u2019t happen,\u201d says Emma.<\/p>\n
She says that it is very hard to get a work visa for the U.S as a foreigner. While it was difficult enough during Joe Biden\u2019s presidency when she was living there, it is even harder under Donald Trump.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have a lot of friends still living in New York. Most of them are from Latin America. They don\u2019t feel comfortable in the U.S anymore,\u201d says Emma.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve heard of stories of people being pulled over. It\u2019s pretty scary. For the moment, I\u2019m really glad to be here. I honestly never felt safer in a country than I do in Ireland.\u201d<\/p>\n
Emma enjoys indulging in her favourite sport of surfing at Garrettstown and Inch beaches in Cork<\/p>\n
When Emma had to let go of her dreams of working for NGOs, she decamped to south-west France \u2013 to learn surfing and to work in an ice-cream shop. (Surfing is a passion that she now indulges in Garrettstown and Inch beach.)<\/p>\n
While back in France, she met \u201can amazing lady who helps people to reorient themselves. She really helped me to figure out what I wanted to do. I realised I want to be a writer.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I was a child, my dream was to be an author. I\u2019m basically fulfilling my childhood dream by going back to study, getting my Masters in creative writing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI fully intend to continue writing and make it my career. I had started working with non-profits but that sector is not an easy one to be in. It\u2019s really hard to make an impact on a large scale.\u201d<\/p>\n
Emma, 27, chose UCC for her Masters as she wanted a place where she could both write and surf.<\/p>\n
\u201cCork is perfect for that. I still want to surf all the time and do my writing.<\/p>\n
\u201cI really like Cork because it\u2019s not too big and it\u2019s easy to get to the sea. Housing is expensive compared to France but the salaries are a little bit better in Ireland.\u201d<\/p>\n
Emma is fluent in English and can also speak Spanish. She now writes in English rather than her native French.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I started writing as a teenager, I used to write in French. Over my time in the U.S, it just naturally evolved to write in English. I\u2019m trying to work on the translation of my soap into French for my family.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Emma completes her Masters next year, she will return to France and may pursue a PhD in writing.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would afford me more time to just write and I\u2019ve always been interested in teaching,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think a PhD would be a good way to see if I like teaching.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s about giving myself options,\u201d says Emma.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A French writer visits Cork to work on a biography of an elderly local woman who has retired…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":531847,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[288,93,61,60],"class_list":["post-531846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-books","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=531846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531846\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/531847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}