I am a Pushcart prize and Best of the Net-nominated, award-winning writer living in Durham. I have had two poetry pamphlets published, ‘This Was Your Mother’ by Dreich Press in 2024 and ‘Splashing Pink’ (a Poetry Book Society Choice) by Hedgehog Press in 2023. My short-story collection, ‘If No One Speaks’, was published by Alien Buddha Press in 2022. I have won the Wirral Festival Poetry Prize, the Charroux Poetry Prize, the First Writer Poetry Prize, the Shooter Flash Prize and the Mum Life Stories Prize. My poems appear in international journals including ‘Rialto’, ‘The North’, ‘Northern Gravy’, ‘Dust Poetry’ and ‘The Storms’. I have an MA in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University and an MA in Writing Poetry with distinction from Newcastle University. I am currently in the final year of a practice-led PhD, ‘Microchimerism: Absence and Attachment in the Poetry of Parenthood’, at York St John University, where I have taught creative writing undergraduates. 

Forthcoming projects include teaching a workshop on loss and connection in parenthood poetry for The Poetry School. https://poetryschool.com/courses/microchimerism-loss-connection-writing-absence-attachment-in-parenthood/

As chief editor and managing director of Sam Szanto Copy-editing and Proofreading, I have approximately 20 years’ experience working with creative writers, academics and students copy-editing and proofreading manuscipts. I can provide advice on all aspects of a manuscript from plot and characterisation through to grammatical and syntactical suggestions. I am also open to requests to mentor writers.