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About me
Hello and welcome to my little place on the internet.
I am a queer neurodivergent (autism + ADHD) Brighton-based author/illustrator represented by Emily Talbot at United Agents.
My debut middle-grade illustrated children's book A Different Sort of Normal was Puffin/Penguin Random House's lead non-fiction debut of 2021 and was longlisted for Best Book with Facts at the Blue Peter Books Awards 2021 and shortlisted for Children’s Non-Fiction Book of the Year at the 2022 British Book Awards.
My debut picturebook and midde-grade fiction books are both publishing with Puffin in 2024.
I often speak on podcasts, TV, radio and at live events about autism, neurodiversity and disability inclusion within publishing and entertainment, and I will be taking booking for school events in late 2023 - so if you'd like to discuss a project/make a booking please get in touch :)
I love creating stories based on my own life experiences to help young people and no-so-young people through difficult situations and emotions. My projects often reflect underrepresented themes including neurodivergence, family addiction and spirituality.
I love bright happy colours, pattern design and limited colour pencil drawings. I work with both digital and traditional media depending on the project. Humour and emotion are important to me.
Exploring the relationship between text and image has always been integral to my practice. As a child I drew pictures within essays, hand-designed homework titles and produced full colour front covers for my class books. This creative fluidity is still very much a part of how I produce work. My sketchbooks are like a child’s diary of memories and I like to design my own fonts , in fact - I designed one of the fonts in A Different Sort of Normal!
I am a graduate of Cambridge School of Art's MA Children's Book Illustration and A Different Sort of Normal was originally the final project of my Masters degree :)
When I'm not writing or drawing children's books you can often find me building creative marketing campaigns for TV & entertainment clients in at Jellyfish Group. For the last
12+ years I've lead social media campaigns for some of the biggest names in the world, including One Direction, Little Mix and Netflix.
Sometimes these two career paths crossover as they did in 2020 when I created a mini sex education/life hack Instagram Storybook for Netflix's animated comedy, Big Mouth. My work has achieved multiple award nominations and in 2020 I won an Emmy award on behalf of Jellyfish/Netflix for the Big Mouth Guide to Life, as well as Webby Honoree status. In 2015 I was nominated for Community Manager of the Year in The Drum's Social Buzz Awards for my work across The X Factor (ITV) and First Dates (Channel 4).
For more facts/showing off feel free to pop on over to my LinkedIn page!
And when I’m not writing/drawing/making social media campaigns, I like to spend time in nature, rollerskating around my living room and making things out of clay.
