Overview
I've worked mostly on commercial fiction (crime/thriller/bookclub fiction), but have also worked on SF/F books (including Andy Weir, Holly Black, and Naomi Novik). I also have experience of working in non-fiction, including memoir and smart non-fiction. As an editor, I work top-down, starting with the bigger picture of what the book needs to work (I focus on structure, plot, and character, in that order), and then dive deeper for a line-edit, ensuring that the manuscript has been tightened as much as possible. My biggest editorial concern is always characters; I'm a firm believer that if the characters sound and feel real to a reader, we can take them to the moon and back.
I work collaboratively, so though I will have my own ideas about what might work and what might not, I want to have a conversation with you about those ideas before the editing begins. At the end of the day, a book belongs to an author, and I'm only here to help and guide them, not take over and insert myself into the process.
I have also been published myself, which means I understand both sides of the editorial relationship: to be edited, and to edit.
Services
Fiction
Languages
Work experience
Amazon Publishing
I was in charge of 20+ authors being published in a digital market (with print too). I worked with authors who have sold over a million copies, with my focus being on retaining readers for my authors who had a rich backlist and finding new readers for authors I acquired. I did this through understanding the digital reader, how to manipulate Amazon's vast website, and ensuring that my authors grew with every new book they wrote with me.
I published mostly crime and thriller writers, with a handful of bookclub fiction writers. During my time at Amazon, I secured the first BBC Book Club pick for the UK Amazon Publishing team, which I was, and am, very proud of. I led on our diversity conversations, ensuring that we were reaching specific audiences for our authors who came from underrepresented backgrounds, whether that was through our marketing or our publicity.
Penguin
My time at Penguin first saw me working as part of the teams on Lisa Jewell, Lisa Gardner, Ernest Cline, and others in commercial fiction. I was then moved over to non-fiction, where my focus was smart non-fiction titles (I worked on a book about the nightingale’s rich history in the UK, a title about how maps can teach us about movement in the world, and reissued several backlist titles). I was then moved, again, to the science fiction and fantasy imprint, Del Rey.
At Del Rey, I was in charge of licensing publishing, which included huge brands such as Star Wars, Stranger Things, Minecraft, Lore Olympus, and more. I also worked on original fiction, from Andy Weir, Holly Black, Naomi Novik and others. Towards the end of my time at Penguin, I had acquired two Black authors writing in fantasy.
Trigger Publishing
At Trigger, I published various non-fiction titles on mental health, mostly memoir. This was a highly-demanding role, which required me to be heavily involved in my authors’ lives, and to be careful with my editing, given the sensitive nature of the topics they were writing about. A lot of my work here, in my editing and publishing, was to ensure that my authors were safe, whether that meant from a legal standpoint or an emotional / physical one too.
I was also responsible for helping with publicity, marketing, sales, and rights, and was often pulled into higher conversations around the strategy of the company. Towards the end of my time at Trigger, I was working on a strategy around publishing fiction, which involved building key relationships with literary agents and companies that could help us do that.
Portfolio
