Hachette announces senior Sheffield hires on one-year anniversary of expansion

Hachette UK has announced the appointment of Yvonne Battle-Felton and Ella Horne into senior roles in its Sheffield office as the publisher celebrates the first anniversary of its expansion into the city, as well as Bristol, Manchester, Edinburgh and Newcastle. 

Battle-Felton has been appointed commissioning editor (fiction) for John Murray Press (JMP) and will start in September. She currently works as principal lecturer in creative writing at Sheffield Hallam University and her début novel, Remembered (Dialogue Books), was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction. She has been a judge of the Jhalak Prize, co-director of North-West Literary Arts and is the creator and host of “Write Your Novel”, a write-along podcast series produced with New Writing North. She initially joins JMP on a part-time basis, as she continues with her commitments at Sheffield Hallam. 

Battle-Felton’s appointment arose out of an invitation from Hachette UK to members of the Black Writers’ Guild (BWG) to signal whether they had interest in pursuing a career in publishing.  She said that her JMP role would enable her to “combine my enthusiasm for developing communities and experience working with writers, with my passion for engaging with readers”. She added: “Sheffield is a vibrant city filled with stories—I’m excited to be joining the Sheffield office and looking forward to strengthening my ties with the community. I can’t wait to build my list.” 

Nels Abbey, BWG co-founder, commented: “The Black Writers’ Guild could not be happier for Yvonne and Hachette UK... Yvonne is an immense talent and will certainly help with the continued transformation and diversification of publishing and we wish her all the very best. Hachette’s partnership on this has been nothing short of stellar and we look forward to finding more enormously impressive creative and executive talent together in the future.” 

Horne has been named as marketing director for Quercus, succeeding Bethan Ferguson in August, also working primarily from Hachette UK’s Sheffield office. Horne, currently senior campaigns manager at Penguin General, will lead the Quercus marketing team and work on some of the imprint’s biggest brands and authors. She was a Bookseller Rising Star in 2019 and co-founded online platform The Flip (Female Leadership in Publishing).  

Quercus m.d. Jon Butler said: “Ella blew us away during the interview process with her energy, strategic vision and pro-active attitude, and we can’t wait for her to start. Hiring a key member of our management team in Sheffield sends a strong signal that we aspire to publish books for the whole country.” Horne added: “I can’t wait to get started in the national office here in Sheffield, connecting readers across the country with Quercus’ brilliant books.” 

The hires are the latest in a series of local appointments made as part of the publisher’s ongoing commitment to forge closer links with local talent and to diversify its workforce. Hachette UK now has 87 staff based across the five cities, with the offices in Manchester, Sheffield and Bristol doubling in size in less than a year. Some 28% of staff across the offices were recruited locally in the past 12 months, and now 21% of UK-based Hachette UK publishing staff (excluding distribution) work outside London. 

Nick Davies, m.d. of JMP and national office lead at Hachette UK, said: “It’s been an extremely productive first year across the five offices, with traineeships, festival sponsorships, mentoring programmes and much more. The most encouraging thing has been to see the growth in local recruitment... Not only does this help bring diverse new talent into our industry, but it helps us to create important new links with readers, writers and booksellers in communities beyond London.”