About TLC

Company History

While working as an editorial assistant in her early years at Virago Press, Rebecca Swift, founder of TLC, realised that there was no professional, trustworthy body for authors to send work to before they approached publishers and agents.

She found that many people writing seemed to know very little of the basics of what publishers and agents expected, and that agents and publishers never had the time to explain in detail what they really felt about people’s work.

The idea for The Literary Consultancy was conceived during these years and set up in 1996 with co-founder Hannah Griffiths, who is now an editor at Faber & Faber.

The Literary Consultancy was invaluable to me for my first novel. I would not dream of sending a completed novel to my publisher without having TLC look at it first.

Prue Leith OBE, author of bestselling Leaving Patrick

Despite initial concern that TLC might not work because clients wouldn’t really want to know what an editor thought of their abilities, TLC has found that quite the opposite has proved true. The majority of clients are pleased to have a detailed critique from a professional who has carefully read and thought about their work, even if the final response is not a recommendation for publication, as they may have hoped. At TLC we try always to be honest, and believe that a constructive but firm response enables authors to get on – either with a re-write, a new project, or indeed, with other things in their lives. Letting go of work can be important too.

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Who we are

Rebecca Swift

Rebecca Swift, born in 1964, read English at Oxford University and has since worked as an editor and writer. For seven years she worked at Virago Press, where she first conceived of the idea for TLC (see About TLC).

For Chatto & Windus she edited a volume of letters between Bernard Shaw and Margaret Wheeler, Letters from Margaret: The Fascinating Story of Two Babies Swapped at Birth (1992) and Imagining Characters: Six Conversations about Women Writers, a book of conversations between writer A.S. Byatt and psychoanalyst Ignês Sodré (1995).

Rebecca has also had poetry published in Virago New Poets (1990), Vintage New Writing 6 (1995) and Driftwood, US, (2005). A libretto written by Rebecca Swift was funded by the Arts Council of England. The opera, composed by Jenni Roditi, and called ‘Spirit Child’, was performed at Ocean, Hackney, in London in 2001. Rebecca has also written and reviewed for The Independent on Sunday and The Guardian.

Rebecca is a trustee of the New Writing Partnership based in Norwich, and the Maya Centre, as well as a member of the Open Word Consortium in London.

In 1999 she completed an M.A. in Psychoanalytic Studies at the Tavistock Centre in London and UEL. Her thesis title was ARE YOU READING ME? An Exploration of the Relationship between people who write and those who read them in the publishing and related industries.

She has appeared at numerous literary festivals and on many panels talking about the work of TLC and the relationship between writers and the publishing industry, and has taught poetry at an American conference in France and West Dean College of Further Education, and lifewriting for the Hackney Music Development Trust. She also teaches ‘Approaches to Publication’ as part of the Writers’ Lab in Skyros, Greece.

Caroline McCarthy

Caroline McCarthy joined The Literary Consultancy as a reader of Literary Fiction and children’s books in 2004 and is now the manager of TLC. Caroline swapped the West Coast for West London at the age of 7 and read English and Classics at Kings, London.

Previously, Caroline worked for Dorling Kindersley and as a reader for Viking and Hamish Hamilton. She has written features and book reviews for The Independent, The Daily Telegraph, The Big Issue, and various fashion and lifestyle articles for women’s magazines and websites. She continues with freelance writing, reading and editing, and is developing her own writing projects.

Jess Porter

Jess Porter read Modern History at Leeds University, specialising in the literature of pre-revolutionary Russia. After a period teaching English as a foreign language at a school in Covent Garden, Jess worked at Persephone Books, where she stayed very happily for two years. Before arriving as the new assistant at TLC Jess had been working in the charity sector for, among others, Help the Aged. She is delighted to have the opportunity at TLC to help develop the work of new writers.

See also:
Press & Publicity
TLC News

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