Contributors
Founding Editor: Jane Bradley
Jane Bradley is the founder and editor of For Books’ Sake. When not obsessing over Patti Smith, watching roller derby, eating cheesecake or drinking too much tea, she writes short stories, plus features for various print and online press. She is the co-editor of For Books’ Sake collections Short Stack and Derby Shorts. Email her here.
Deputy Editor: Alex Herod
Alex Herod is a Manchester-based writer-performer-business bod. When not plotting for For Books’ Sake or wearing out old mixtapes in the car, she can be found setting the world to rights (over a glass of red wine), seeking out collaborative projects (over a glass of red wine), wearing fake moustaches (you can guess what leads to this), spending whole days at the cinema and repeatedly telling everyone about that time she met Margaret Atwood. Email her here.
Reviews Editor: Claire Strickett
Claire Strickett is a London-based writer whose heart belongs to Glasgow. She read for her Masters in Women’s Studies at the University of Oxford, and has also lived for some time in France. Claire’s love of books is rivalled only by her love of food, and when she’s not reading and writing she’s usually to be found in the kitchen, surrounded by a vast and ever-growing collection of cookbooks – with Radio 4 her constant companion. Email her here.
Interviews Editor: Cariad Martin
Cariad Martin is a Kent-based writer with a degree in Photography and Creative Writing. She lived in London for five years before realizing she couldn’t possibly live anywhere but by the sea. When not bugging authors for interviews, she spends her time writing, crafting with her mum and tweeting excessively about her cats, books and feminism (but mostly cats). Email her here.
Features Editor: Beulah Maud Devaney
Beulah Maud Devaney grew up in a blue house in a fishing village on the North-East coast. Currently based in North-East London, she has an MA in Publishing and is working for a medical publisher she’s not allowed to tweet about. In her spare time she knits gloriously misshapen jumpers, rides her bike and collects old Virago paperbacks. She loves Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Hunger Games, Shirley Jackson, Angela Carter, coffee and lamebook.
News Editor: Rebecca Winson
Rebecca Winson grew up in the Lake District, from which she fled as soon as she got a chance. Currently in denial about no longer being based in London, she is begrudgingly living the good life with an allotment and a wormery in Hampshire. She holds a BA in English Literature from the University of London, and works in publishing. Her favourite writers are Angela Carter, Charlotte Brontë and Bob Dylan.
Contributing Editor: Jess Haigh
Jess Haigh lives in Leeds, where she also runs The Travelling Suitcase Library, and specialises in promoting reading for pleasure. She loves Stella Gibbons, Shardlake and the Dewey Decimal System, and hates bigots and book snobs. You can tweet her @BookElfLeeds, or find her ranting away on her blog.
Contributing Editor: Kaite Welsh
Kaite Welsh is an author, reviewer, freelance journalist and copywriter. She studied English Literature at Edinburgh University, writing her undergraduate dissertation on female sexuality in science fiction, before moving to Sussex University to do an MA in Sexual Dissidence and Cultural Change. It makes an excellent ice-breaker in job interviews.
Contributing Editor: Rachelle Thompson
Rachelle Thompson was bribed with books in exchange for good conduct as a child, leading to a life of literary obsession not necessarily resulting in good behaviour. She is a community strategist for a digital agency, occasionally blogging about culinary delights and travelling highlights. At her happiest she is multitasking: reading, tweeting and drinking (mostly black coffee).
Contributing Editor: Alexis Somerville
Alexis Somerville is a Brighton-based writer, teacher, artist and coffee enthusiast. She hails from York and has lived in Taiwan, China and Sicily. She has an unhealthy obsession with crazy stationery which she mostly uses to write letters and unnecessary lists. She likes drawing pictures of space ladies and confused-looking animals. She is obsessed with books, films and music. She sometimes writes for music websites as well for her own blog.
Contributing Editor: Alisande Fitzsimons
Alisande Fitzsimons lives in Dublin. She wrote her undergrad dissertation on groupie memoirs and her Masters thesis on the depiction of women in Northern Irish Troubles dramas. When she’s editing the entertainment section of HI! Magazine, she’s contributing to other websites or tweeting.
Francesca Baker
Francesca Baker is incurably curious, reads everything she can and scribbles her thoughts as much as possible. She’d love to be a real life journalist and bona fide novelist, but to keep paying the bills, she’s sticking to doing it purely for the love. Possibly even more passionate about music than she is literature (can I say that?!), she runs a music magazine called It’s All Happening and promotes gigs in West London.
Tara Hanks
Tara Hanks is a married mum of two, living in Brighton. She is the author of two books, including The Mmm Girl, a novel about the life of Marilyn Monroe – as she might have told it herself. She also blogs about Marilyn at ES Updates. When not working on her third novel, Tara likes watching old movies and reading anything by Emily Brontё or Donna Tartt.
Amanda O’Boyle
Amanda O’Boyle works in book publishing, and previous jobs include ball-bearing distributor, pub bouncer and bookshop manager. She was born in Canada, but moved to East London on a whim, which she counts among her wisest and most irresponsible decisions. Current book-related goals include reading all of Alice Munro’s short stories and one day finishing the last 500 pages of Gravity’s Rainbow.
Laura Vickers
Laura Vickers is a freelance writer with a sideline in being a professional wine geek. When she isn’t having bubble baths with a glass of champers in one hand and a well-thumbed paperback in the other, or wishing she was in black-and-white movies, she’s plotting adventures – either for herself or the characters in her next novel. She blogs and tweets and when she grows up, she wants to be Barbara from The Good Life.
Sarah Kiddle
Sarah Kiddle is an English teacher who is passionate about punctuation and regularly bores students with her odes to the semi-colon. Her raving about books in class occasionally creates converts. When not procrastinating (reading), Sarah writes poetry, tentatively plans a novel, and lindy hops (badly). Sarah is planning to write her MAEd. dissertation on girls’ risk-taking in writing. She loves Margo Lanagan, Jeanette Winterson and Angela Carter.
Sarah Chapman
Sarah Chapman is an unrepentant book-hoarder living in Newcastle. She works at Mslexia, but is always plotting for ways to open her own ‘pre-loved’ bookshop in the future (with a cat, obviously). She did her MA in Agatha Christie and growls at bad TV adaptations. She is a coffee fiend, loves Daphne du Maurier, Angela Carter, owls and pandas. She also writes for her own blog and We Love This Book.
Kate Kerrow
Kate Kerrow is a London-based writer. She trained in the theatre and worked as an actress and musician for eight years. She also has a degree in English Literature and is just finishing her MA. Kate writes novels and plays, as well as reviewing various art forms. When not writing, she can be found playing her piano too loud and pretending to be Tori Amos.
Jenny Tipping
Jenny Tipping graduated from Bristol University in 1998 and then again in 2004 and 2005. She finally turned her back on academia and now earns her living driving trucks. When not planning all the marvellous books she will one day write, she loves rowing on, walking by and sitting in cafés next to the sea. Jenny loves narrative history, biography and any book which refuses to be squeezed into a literary box.
Emily Reynolds
Emily Reynolds writes about the intersection of feminism and popular culture as well as books, films and telly. She considers herself the PoundLand version of Charlie Brooker and tweets too much.
