ABOUT ME

On the path to editing

I grew up in London with a British mother and an American father in a house full of books. With a love of languages, I studied German (BA Hons, University of Southampton) and spent two years in Germany – attending school in Hanover, where I lived with a German host family, then later as a student at Heidelberg University, where I studied a range of subjects including history of art and literature.

Having always been a wordsmith and book-lover, I could never envisage working in any industry other than publishing. After six months of solo travel in China, Malaysia and Indonesia, I returned to London and got my first publishing job as Project Editor at Merehurst (Murdoch Books), followed by several years in-house at Dorling Kindersley (DK Penguin Random House).

Going freelance

In 1995, I moved out of London to Cheltenham, in the Cotswolds, and became a freelance editor, undertaking regular commissions from some of the UK’s top publishers, as well as working on marketing material for businesses.

After three decades of editing, I still love what I do. I thrive on the challenge of creating order from chaos, and enjoy the minutiae of editing – striving for precision, thinking about the meaning and function of every word, and dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s. Variety is also a huge plus. I’ve been very fortunate to work on a wide range of subject areas with expert authors who are at the top of their field. As a result, I am constantly learning, so the work continues to be fresh and stimulating.

Life beyond work

I have two children and my interests and activities, in no particular order, include travel, reading, film, music, opera, art, history, cookery, tennis and pilates. In addition, I volunteer twice a week as a one-to-one reading coach for Read Easy – a UK-based adult literacy charity.