The Basics
I fell into editing when an English professor allowed me to turn an office-hours meeting about a paper into Publishing 101, and a few months later, I landed at the Columbia Publishing Course — then, on the internet, where I wrote copy and coordinated editorial features for several community sites for readers (back when “internet” was still capitalized per CMS) before moving over to Picador, an imprint of Macmillan and a leading publisher of literary fiction and nonfiction. Over the next eight years, I established a diverse and wide-ranging list of bestselling and award-winning titles before joining the ghostwriting firm Kevin Anderson & Associates as Senior Editor, where I facilitated successful partnerships between clients and collaborators, helping thought leaders, celebrities, memoirists, and C-suite executives bring their book ideas to life.
The Stories I’ve Worked On
The projects I worked on at Kevin Anderson & Associates have been represented by leading literary agencies — among them WME and 3 Arts Entertainment — and found homes at Big Five imprints and top-tier independent publishers. Titles I acquired, edited, and published for Picador have gone on to become New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and USA Today bestsellers and have won or become finalists for a number of major national and international awards — including The Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Award, the Edgar and Eisner Awards, the PRISM Contest, the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award for Fiction, the Desmond Elliott and Dylan Thomas Prizes, the International DUBLIN Literary Award, the Southern Book Prize, and the Women's Prize for Fiction. Six of these books were also optioned for film and television, and another — Yewande Omotoso’s U.S. debut, The Woman Next Door — was chosen as an official selection for National Reading Group Month. While at Picador, I also oversaw a majority of the reprint list, publishing André Aciman, Robin Sloan, Brigid Schulte, Héctor Tobar, Terry Tempest Williams, Ari Berman, John Darnielle, C.E. Morgan, and many others in paperback.
The Stories I Love
My projects reflect an affinity for sharp but accessible writing; strong, dynamic characters (who often feel displaced from the world or from themselves); and stories that give voice to underrepresented experiences and perspectives. I am a great reader for literary and upmarket fiction across several categories, narrative nonfiction (particularly projects with a strong human element), memoir, and books with a big-idea angle; I am not very well versed in romance, wellness, and self-help. If you’re not sure how to categorize your work-in-progress, talking and thinking about books are among my favorite activities, and I’d be thrilled to talk with you about yours. If you’re a nonfiction author or are working on a conceptual non-book project, I’ve been developing and evaluating proposals for ten years and would love to help you craft and polish a compelling message.
The Miscellaneous Biographical Details
I grew up in central North Carolina and spent a year in the West Elks of Colorado, training at altitude for track and cross-country, before moving to New York City, where I earned a B.A. in American Studies from Columbia University and started editing after I discovered it was possible to read professionally. (Six-year-old Me is still thrilled, and I’m still grateful to the professor who helped me realize this.) Fourteen years, two boroughs, and too many apartments later, I decided to head for the hills again — this time, to Colorado Springs.