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Quercus publisher Jane Wood to move into freelance consultant role
Jane Wood, publisher on the commercial fiction list at Quercus, is set to move into a freelance consultant role at the publisher.
Wood will move into the role from January 2025, and will continue to provide first reads and edits on her list of authors. The day-to-day publishing will remain in-house with overall publisher Cassie Browne and her team.
Wood started her career as an assistant to editors Barley Alison and John Blackwell at Secker & Warburg. She then moved to Arrow Paperbacks as editorial director five years later. She learned her trade in commercial, mass-market publishing before publishing names at Pan Macmillan including Wilbur Smith, Ken Follett, Rachel Billington and the Cazalet Chronicles of Elizabeth Jane Howard.
Four years later, Wood was publishing director at Orion, where she managed the fiction list for more than 10 years and worked with authors such as Michael Connelly, James Lee Burke, Diane Setterfield and Erica James.
Wood said: "I have loved my many years at Quercus, working with Jon Butler and Cassie Browne and our fantastic fiction team. They have given me the time to develop authors’ careers over the long term. The first author I acquired for Quercus was Elly Griffiths with her debut The Crossing Places. She is now a huge bestseller. Other authors on my list include the Costa-winning Stef Penney, Henry Porter, SG MacLean, Prue Leith, Jane Thynne (also writing as CJ Carey), Martin Walker, Trevor Wood and the late, great Philip Kerr. Most of them are prize winners; all of them are fantastic storytellers and I am proud to have published every one of them."
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Quercus managing director Jon Butler said: "I would like to thank Jane for all her inspirational work and friendship over my time at Quercus. She has had the most extraordinary career, and I’m very happy that the R word (retirement) remains banned for, I hope, many years to come. Jane brings so much commitment, quality and grace to everything she does. The growth trajectory of Elly Griffiths in particular has lit up the past 10 years, and she has mentored many, many people across Hachette – but she has also been a leading light pushing for better recruitment and representation of over 50s in the publishing industry, having helped to form Hachette’s AgeWise network back in 2018.
"Above all, though, it comes back to the authors. Jane has proven so many times that her editing makes great books even better, and she embodies everything that a writer could want in their editor or publisher: a true champion who will always go the extra mile to take their work to as many readers as possible."
Browne said: "Jane has been an integral member of the Quercus Fiction editorial team since well before I arrived and has been a huge part of its growth in that time. Her talent and flawless taste have shaped a list of genre-defining authors who have gone on to become bestselling and award-winning brands, in the UK and internationally.
"It is hard to find a publisher who is more energised by the books, as well as one so absolutely dedicated to the work and success of her authors. I want to thank Jane for being such an incredible inspiration to me and to our whole team. She has made us all better publishers and editors, and her commercial instinct for a great book and the passion she bestows to every publication has been a joy and a privilege to observe.
"I’m so very grateful for her deep and dear friendship along the way, and for her brilliant sense of fun that goes with it. This new editorial role means Jane’s close and important relationship with her authors continues, and their publishing teams can now expand in an exciting new way."
