Writing and reading are my passions and I have many years’ experience as a professional writer, editor and creative writing tutor.

I started out as a sub-editor and then reporter and freelance feature writer for national publications, including The Times, The Guardian, The Stage and the Times Educational Supplement. I was managing editor of a group of magazines for a professional institute, researched and wrote publications for housing charity Shelter and was commissioned to research and write several books on social issues and on business management.
 
I wrote my first play at university and then in London pursued the craft of playwriting with some excellent teachers, in particular Bernard Kops and Tom Ryan, as well as through workshops with new writing theatres, including the Royal Court and Paines Plough. I took this further with an MA in Creative Writing and Theatre at Essex University, where I was fortunate enough to be taught by playwright Jonathan Lichtenstein and by Professor Marina Warner, whose work on myth and fairy tales continues to inspire me.

As secretary of Hertford Writers’ Circle I’ve edited and seen through to publication five anthologies of members’ work. A sixth – Herts and Minds – is due to be published December 2019. www.hertfordwriterscircle.org
 
 I was one of the organisers of the 2012 national short story competition ‘3 into 1’ judged by novelists Michael Dobbs and Adele Geras.
 
I’ve run many creative writing course and workshops in Hertfordshire, for adults and for young people, and am strongly committed to helping people discover the creativity which is in all of us.
 
Qualifications
MA (with Distinction) in Theatre, University of Essex, 2010
BA Hons (1st class) in English, University of Southampton, 1981
 
Member of the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain, National Union of Journalists and 
the National Association of Writers in Education.