On my way to The Business Book Awards last week where my business memoir Ahead of her Time: How a One-Woman Startup Became a Global Publishing Brand, published by Watkins, won the Best Book Award for Business Journey.

I had got up most days in 2019 and written for three or four hours, discovering why most famous authors only write for a few hours each day as writing is not just intense creative work but hard physical work too. To help get started on the activity of writing – I had not written a full-length book before – I enrolled in a writing class and attended a writing workshop run by Mark Matousek, whose own memoir I had once published. During 2020 I found both a literary agent and a publisher. The book came out in April 2021, just after lockdown ended. In 2022 I unexpectedly became an award-winning author. The Business Journey continues.

I wrote the book to answer the question which I had been asked many times during my career – ‘how did you do it?’ I wrote it for every woman who has always wanted to start her own business and men have found it helpful reading also.

The Award judges described it as ‘authentic’ and ‘page-turning’, a description rarely used about business writing. All those books I had published over the years, both non-fiction and fiction (‘she won his heart’) had clearly come in useful.

Ahead of her Time is the story of how a brilliant publishing company was created from my bedroom before the days of computers and the internet. It reveals much about the commercial world and about the publishing industry. The Award has inspired me to create new dreams. I feel much gratitude to everyone who helped, supported and encouraged me in the writing and publication of this book. Thank you all so much!