A Reigate author has turned to motherhood in the middle-class minefield for her debut novel.

Kerry Fisher is set to release her first novel this September, The School Gate Survival Guide.

The story telling of the life of a cleaner for ladies who lunch, who juggles her work wiping up spilt Sauvignon and hoovering around handbags with rushing back home to skivvy after her children's feckless father on an estate, will be published by HarperCollins.

An unusual inheritance catapults the heroine into a different world, where no child can survive without organic apricots and Kumon maths classes, and no woman can contemplate a week without Pilates and pedicures.

But her life is further complicated when she is drawn to a man she believes can help her family fit in, but is not sure whether his interest in her is purely professional.

Kerry, who is married with two children, has been described as an exciting new voice on the women’s fiction scene. Her writing has been hailed as bringing an insight and humour to the problems that life throws at us all, and as speaking to women with families from every walk of life.

Kerry, who was brought up in Peterborough, studied at Bath University, and who speaks fluent Italian, Spanish and French, trained as a journalist at City University, before writing travel guidebooks for Thomas Cook.

But after landing her dream job working on women’s magazines, she said she discovered that she wasn’t able to write about real people in case their families got upset.

The Writers’ Program at the University of California helped her move from fact into fiction.

Kerry said: “We moved to Surrey from Lancashire in 2000, when my husband was relocated for work.”

She said: “We lived in Reigate for over a decade before moving to Lower Kingswood. “There's so much to love about this area. I like the community feel to Reigate. I always bump into someone I know in town.”

She continued: “Priory Park is fantastic - when my children were young it saved my sanity on more than one occasion. “We are also so lucky to have wonderful countryside on our doorstep.”

A keen dog-owner too, she said: “I've got a naughty lab/giant schnauzer-cross, and we walk on Reigate Hill every day. “It's such a privilege to see all the changing seasons, yet still have all the facilities of a lovely town just a ten-minute drive away.”

And she confessed: “I actually prefer it when it's raining and there aren't any picnickers about,” but added, “My dog does like a ham sandwich with a few crisps!”