Her parents had been brought up in Orthodox Jewish households but distanced themselves from their faith. Coren attended independent girls' schools between the ages of five and 18, [ 8 ] including St Paul's Girls' School , [ 9 ] and read English at St John's College, Oxford. I was not like the girls there. At the age of 14, Coren had a short story published under a pseudonym in Just Seventeen magazine [ 13 ] and then won a competition in The Daily Telegraph to write a column about teenage life for their "Weekend" section, which she continued writing during her own teenage years.
During a Channel 4 broadcast, she explained that one Telegraph reader had written to her, criticising her column and had used a very great number of swear words, all in Latin. Her books include Love 16 [ 15 ] and Once More, with Feeling , about her attempt with co-author Charlie Skelton to make "the greatest porn film ever". Victoria and Giles Coren wrote an introduction to Chocolate and Cuckoo Clocks , an anthology of the best comic writing by their father Alan, published by Canongate in October In , after the death of her father, having put a notice in The Times inviting those who knew him to attend a service, she was warned by a friend that a "gang of serial funeral crashers" based in the south of England were checking death notices to find funerals and memorial services to crash for their own enjoyment.
After receiving some suspicious email replies to her notice, she instigated a hoax to trap the group. She created "Sir William Ormerod" and placed a death notice. A week later, she placed another notice in The Times "in the guise of his grieving boyfriend Peter" for his memorial service "followed by a drinks reception".
During her poker career, she has become a close friend of The Hendon Mob and mixes weekly home games with frequent visits to two regular casinos. She appeared in five episodes of Late Night Poker , although she never made it to a series grand final.
However, in Late Night Poker 's spin-off Celebrity Poker Club , she defeated Willie Thorne to win the series two grand final before joining Jesse May as the commentator in series three. In the Hold-Em tournament in London, she was a guest dealer for the final table. She has been a member of Team PokerStars Pro, [ 35 ] but in November she removed her endorsement a few hours after PokerStars had announced they were starting an online casino.
