Who am I?
As a child, I read voraciously. Later, in high school, the librarian set aside books she thought I might like, and I devoured them all. From historical fiction to science fiction, romance and general fiction, I immersed myself in all of these worlds. My love for the written word carried through to adulthood . . .
“You write to communicate to the hearts and minds of others what’s burning inside you, and we edit to let the fire show through the smoke.”
Arthur Plotnik
Author of The Elements of Editing
After graduating from high school in 1997, I went on to obtain a double honours degree in creative writing and English literature at Concordia University, in Montreal, Quebec.
For ten years or so afterward, I travelled around the world teaching English as a second language. During that time, I lived in South Korea, New Zealand, Bangladesh, Thailand and France. I then returned to Montreal for a graduate diploma in journalism as I wanted to explore the writing field from a different angle.
I later moved abroad again, teaching English in Saudi Arabia and then Egypt before working as an editor at Egypt Independent, the predominant English newspaper in Egypt at the time.
When I returned to Canada in 2016, settling in Toronto this time, I worked as a content editor for The Hamilton Spectator and the Toronto Star before setting up my own business. Today, I freelance for various clients, including individual authors, hybrid publishers and advertising agencies.
What's in a name?
Words have meaning.
I named this editing business Red Tree Editing for a few reasons.
First, I love trees. They connect the earth to the sky. They both ground us and encourage us to dream. They start as seeds and grow into big and beautiful things.
Books are like trees. They start as seeds in people’s minds and then become living entities unto themselves. Trees are a symbol of creation. Books are creations of the mind come to life.
Second, I called it Red Tree Editing, in particular, because Frédéric Chaban—a wonderful artist who is credited with all of the art on this site—painted the red tree that is my logo. He understood my love for trees, and he promised to paint me a forest. Though I never got to have that forest, I keep this one tree as a symbol of creativity, of possibility, of life.
Merci, Frédéric, pour tout ce que tu m’as appris.