Laura Marshall is the Sunday Times top ten and Kindle No. 1 bestselling author of five psychological thrillers. Her debut novel, FRIEND REQUEST, was published by Sphere (Little, Brown) in 2017 and sold over half a million copies in the UK alone. It was translated into twenty-five languages and optioned for TV. She went on to have a further three bestselling novels (THREE LITTLE LIES, THE ANNIVERSARY and MY HUSBAND’S KILLER) published by Sphere. Her fifth novel A GOOD PLACE TO HIDE A BODY was optioned for TV prior to its publication by Hodder & Stoughton in July 2024, and a sixth novel is coming from the same publisher in 2025. Laura also works as a freelance editor and mentor and has a strong instinct for commercial fiction and what makes a story spring off the page. She is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: commercial fiction/crime/suspense/psychological thriller

Bethany is a former Senior Editor at Penguin Random House, where she was involved in the WriteNow mentoring scheme and the #Merky Books New Writers' Prize. She has ten years' experience in the industry, working at both commercial and independent publishing houses. Bethany has worked on non-fiction by authors such as David Attenborough, Stacey Dooley and Ray Mears, and novels by Jenny Colgan, Rachaele Hambleton and Adam Hills. She has an MA in Creative Writing (Prose Fiction) from the University of East Anglia and regularly teaches creative writing summer schools and weekend courses. Bethany is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: memoir, narrative non-fiction and contemporary fiction.

Isobel has a broad range of experience in the publishing industry. As a reader for literary agencies for over four years, she specialises in in-depth, market-focused and approachable feedback that aims to help writers strengthen their manuscripts and bring out the full potential of their stories. After graduating with a degree in French from Oxford and working as a bookseller, Isobel started out at Cornerstones Literary Consultancy, working on editorial development and project management across a range of manuscripts. She has also worked in International Sales at Canongate, and most recently in Translation Rights at Curtis Brown, where she handled rights across the children’s list and the French list of clients. Isobel is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: upmarket/book club and literary fiction, fantasy, adult commercial (women’s, historical, mystery/suspense), middle-grade and YA and crossover (across all genres).

Sarah has over six years of experience in the publishing industry. Following internships at OUP and Palgrave Macmillan, she spent the first stretch of her career as Desk Editor at Cornerstones Literary Consultancy, where she primarily oversaw the development of fiction and nonfiction titles (adult and children's), and supervised a team of freelance professional editors. Sarah also acted as a scout for agents, preparing authors for submission through the consultancy's scouting programme. She is now an Editorial Project Manager for whitefox, and, as a freelancer, enjoys working across a range of books, identifying ‘big-picture’ issues that might be preventing manuscripts from reaching their full potential. Her goal is to help bring an author’s vision to life, and to ensure a book is perfectly-pitched to compete in the marketplace. Sarah is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: upmarket/book club fiction, contemporary, experimental fiction, queer fiction, campus novels and coming-of-age tales, noir, speculative fiction, narrative nonfiction

Jo has worked in literary agencies for over ten years and most recently was the Children’s Literary Agent at The Blair Partnership where she looked after a list of picture book authors and children’s non-fiction and fiction authors across the age range from 5 to YA. She has discovered and secured deals for many prize-winning and notable writers including Helena Duggan, Katy Birchall, Kieran Larwood, Sir Chris Hoy, Dawn Coulter-Cruttenden, JJ Arcanjo, Oli Hyatt, Nicki Thornton, Earthling Ed and PA Staff. Spotting commercial fiction has given Jo a strong sense of what works well in the children’s market. She thrives on working collaboratively and creatively with authors at any stage of their writing career. Jo is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: children’s fiction from young (5-8), through middle grade and teen to YA fiction

Annabel is an Oxford University English graduate and a multi-award winning children’s author whose work is published in over twenty countries. Her first novel, My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece, won the Branford Boase Award for most outstanding debut in 2011, and was shortlisted for several major literary awards including the Carnegie Medal. Her second book, Ketchup Clouds, was named the Waterstones Children’s Book of the Year in 2013 and won an Edgar Award in the USA for best young adult fiction. Her third novel, Silence is Goldfish, was published in 2015 to great critical acclaim and her fourth novel, The Last Days of Archie Maxwell, was published in November 2017. She has also recently signed a three-book picture book deal with Hachette. Annabel has tutored on Arvon courses and has been a guest lecturer at Bath Spa and Sheffield Hallam Universities on their creative writing courses, and is a regular reviewer of children and young adult fiction for The Guardian. Annabel is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: children's fiction, young adult fiction, picture books

Bryony is an award-winning author who writes horror, dystopia and paranormal novels for young adults (published by Egmont, Stripes and UCLAN), thrillers for adults (published by Avon/Harper Collins) and science fiction short stories also for adults (published in various anthologies). She is a former Cornerstones author who was passed through to an agent. Bryony has an MACantab in English Literature from Cambridge University, regularly speaks at schools and festivals and teaches the course Writing for Children at City University. She has been an editor and mentor with Cornerstones since 2014. Writers she has worked with at Cornerstones include Scott Bain (shortlisted for the Bath Novel Award, now repped by Lauren Gardner) and Muhammad Khan (now an award winning YA novelist). Bryony is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: MG/YA/Adult, thriller, crime, science fiction, dystopia, horror, fantasy

As a former broadcast journalist and producer for the BBC, Judith has worked with both published and unpublished writers, conducted writing workshops and competitions, and produced a book of children’s short stories for BBC Children in Need. She works for publishers including Oxford University Press and the Jacaranda Literary Agency in Singapore. She was the editor of Tiny Feet, Tiny Shoes by Adeline Foo which won the Asian Children’s Book Award in May 2017. She is an Associate Tutor for the MA Publishing Course at the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies at Oxford Brookes University, and was recently made a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. She mainly works with children’s books, especially Middle Grade fiction and picture books but has also recently worked with self-published authors on adult fiction. Judith is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: children's, middle grade fiction, YA, picture books, chapter books for early readers

Vanessa N is an experienced editor of fiction and memoir. She started out her editorial career at Virago/Little, Brown, working with high-profile literary authors, before moving to become a Commissioning Editor at Random House, buying in and editing fiction and memoir. She’s the author of eleven novels under pseudonyms, published by Sphere, Quercus and Simon & Schuster, and has been published in thirteen countries. She is a dedicated editor and writing mentor, with a passion for helping writers find and develop their voices. Vanessa is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: literary fiction, commercial women’s fiction, historical, suspense, book club fiction, and memoir

Susannah worked for seven years at Rogers, Coleridge and White literary agency with a UK agent and in Foreign Rights with clients such as Francesca Segal and Owen Sheers. She was Managing Editor of the Jewish Quarterly for five years publishing work by writers including Naomi Alderman, Cynthia Ozick and Adam Foulds. Susannah is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: Literary fiction, commercial fiction, women's fiction

Ayisha began her publishing career at Penguin Random House, joining Cornerstones Literary Consultancy as editorial assistant in 2010 where she became managing editor within her first year. She holds an MA in Creative Writing and her debut novel, Sofia Khan is Not Obliged, Bonnier, was published in January 2016, a WH Smith’s Fresh Talent pick. This Green and Pleasant Land was published by Zaffre Books in 2019. She now writes full-time and also works as a ghostwriter. Ayisha is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: General Fiction, Commercial Fiction

Kate is the author of six picture books including the best-selling Santa’s Suit (Campbell Books). Kate reviews picture books for IBBY and is passionate about the picture book as a vibrant, inclusive art form. Her MG work-in-progress was shortlisted in the 2020 Wells Festival of Literature Children’s Novel Competition. Kate is also a prize-winning writer of short stories, flash fiction and poetry, with work placed at the Winchester Festival, the WRITE Festival, Bath Flash Fiction Award and Shoreham Wordfest and published in three anthologies. Kate has a PhD in Creative Writing specialising in maps in children’s books and has been an editor and mentor for Cornerstones since 2008. Kate is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: Picture books, chapter books for young readers and middle grade fiction up to age 12

Shabnom is based in London and has a BA in English Literature from Oxford. She is an experienced editor who has edited novels across the commercial, literary and YA fiction genres with a warm, knowledgeable and detailed approach to manuscripts. She is particularly experienced with literary agent submissions with several years of experience as a submissions reader for agents and literary scouts. Shabnom reviews fiction for the Sunday Times, and she is a market editor.

Interests: adult commercial and literary fiction, historical fiction, women’s fiction, older YA, science fiction, fantasy, crime/thriller/mystery, genre fiction

Amanda has worked as a developmental editor since 2011, first within Strange Chemistry and Angry Robot and thereafter as a freelancer. Her clients for editing and proofreading include Angry Robot Books, Aconyte Books, Black Library, Orion Dash, Macmillan Kids and Wise Ink. She is also a literary agent with Azantian Literary Agency. Amanda is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: adult science fiction and fantasy, young adult of all genres

Lindsay is a former Sunday Times and Telegraph travel columnist. Her travel column “An Englishwoman Abroad”, began in The Sunday Telegraph in 2000 and ran for seven years. Her articles for The Sunday Times, “Have Kids Will travel” followed a year’s trip travelling solo with her two young boys around South East Asia. Their most recent trip, featured in a monthly column for The Independent called “The Rainbow Hunters”, took them around the world to find the origin of colour, raising money for the charity War Child as they travelled. She is also an accomplished fiction writer with numerous short stories published and in 2015 her first novel Jakob’s Colours, shortlisted for The Authors Club First Novel Award, was published by Hodder and Stoughton. Lindsay is currently an Associate Lecturer in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University and is writing her second novel. She is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: Travel, adventure and nature writing. All fiction especially literary, women's fiction, crime, thrillers, commercial fiction and experimental.

Dan has worked for Macmillan, Hachette, Quarto and various other major publishers for over twenty years, developing and editing non-fiction and reference projects. As an author, he has written over thirty books for both adults and children. As well as a series of short biographies of great thinkers (which have sold some half a million copies), he has covered subjects as diverse as true crime, history, politics, economics, quizzing and Sherlock Holmes! Two of his most recent narrative non-fiction books have been nominated for the Crime Writers Association Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction. He is also a scriptwriter for the Short History of... and Real Dictators podcast series (produced by the British Podcast Award-winning Noiser Productions), which receive multi-million downloads each month. He graduated in English from Cardiff University and lives in Hertfordshire with his wife and two young children. Dan is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: narrative non-fiction, biography and memoir, sport, true crime, history, literature, politics, economics

Rachel is a literary agent with the Ben Illis Agency and the author of six books, published by Simon & Schuster, OUP, and Scholastic US. She has a first-class degree in English Literature and Language and a PGCE in Secondary English, which she puts to good use running creative writing workshops and events for both adults and children. Rachel also freelances as an editor, copywriter, and festival moderator to feed her need for new stories. Rachel is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: Middle Grade and YA fiction, especially action, mystery, diverse voices, and comedy. Also children's non-fiction

Sandra is an award-winning children’s and YA author of over two dozen books published worldwide; her latest book, Hairy Horror, is published by Andersen. As a qualified and experienced teacher and a commercially published author, Sandra has been combining her two professional skills for many years. She also gives talks and workshops and teaches creative writing to adults. She has been an editor and mentor with Cornerstones since 2004, working with authors from beginner through to submission level. Offering constructive and supportive advice, she has helped many clients on their way to both commercial publication and successful self-publishing. Sandra is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: Children's, YA - I very much enjoy mentoring new writers

Freda is the author of twenty-one novels and a new short story collection, Nights of Blood Wine. She has written in a wide variety of fantasy styles including epic, supernatural, vampire, historical and contemporary. Her books have been published by Hodder & Stoughton, Pan Macmillan, Penguin, Simon & Schuster, Tor (US) and Titan Books. In 1997 her novel Dracula the Undead won the Dracula Society’s Best Gothic Novel Award, and her 2009 contemporary fantasy Elfland won the Romantic Times Award for Best Fantasy Novel. She’s taken part in all kinds of creative writing activities including groups, workshops, mentoring and editorial work. Freda is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: Fantasy and science fiction, psychological thrillers, mystery, paranormal, gothic, magical realism, literary fiction, erotica, anything unique and character-centred.

Kylie is the author of four historical novels, published by Weidenfeld & Nicholson and Head of Zeus. She has been a manuscript and script editor for over ten years in the UK, the US, and Australia, and has worked with authors such as Jake Woodhouse on his Inspector Rykel series, Suellen Dainty, Jenny McVeigh, Jack Woolf and Claire Kendall. She has worked for the BBC and has a PhD in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University where she is a lecturer. Kylie has been an editor and mentor with Cornerstones since 2009. Kylie is a Cornerstones market editor.

Interests: commercial, historical, crime