My love of reading began with weekly trips to the library in Swaffham down a lane that’s wonderfully called The Pightle. Words have since become my work as well as my passion: I’m an award-winning poet and creative writing tutor.
I’ve been writer-in-residence at the London Science Museum’s Dana Research Centre, the John Jarrold Printing Museum, and RLF Fellow at the University of East Anglia. Through my teaching for the Poetry School, Poetry Society, National Centre for Writing, and The Writing Coach, I work with writers across the world.
My first collection, Electric Shadow, was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney Centre prize. The Print Museum won the East Anglian Book Award for Poetry. Return by Minor Road was featured in The Guardian and selected as both a Poetry Society and Out-Spoken Press book of the year. My short story ‘Glacial’ was shortlisted for the Fish Short Story prize.
I enjoy all sorts of writing, and this led me to study poetry and prose in evening classes at the University of East Anglia. I did this while working as an advertising copywriter and discussing very different types of writing during the day! I’m currently in the final stages of a Masters in Creative Writing at Oxford, where we write and discuss plays, memoir, novels, scripts, poetry, creative nonfiction and more. I love the insights into language, relationships, cultures, and the world that arise in discussing literature with others.