Carol Lee

Carol is an author who began her career as a journalist working in national newspapers, radio and television. She is also a playwright and poet. Born in Carmarthenshire and brought up in various parts of the world, including Tanzania, she considers herself to be part English, part Welsh and part African.

Her nine published books include Crooked Angels, shortlisted for the annual Mind award; To Die For, an account of her goddaughter’s struggle with anorexia (a best-seller in the UK); and A Child Called Freedom, written to mark the 30th anniversary of the Soweto Uprising in South Africa. Her latest book Out of Winter recounts ‘the road back to a parent’s house’: the time she spent as an adult ‘child’ returning to care for her parents during the last two years of their lives.

Taught by her grandfather, a Welsh coalminer, to ‘protest and survive’, she has spent much of her time fighting to help writers keep their copyright. Current assaults on authors’ rights — ones like ‘the written word should be free’ and ‘copyright is a restriction on trade’ — keep her protesting. She has survived over the years by dancing tango and playing tennis.

Carol has been copyright consultant for the NUJ and sat on the board of the Authors’ Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS) from 2008 until 2013. She has taught at school and university level, her pioneering work on sex education in London schools resulting in her first book, The Ostrich Position.