The fit to print team is me – Ali Turnbull – employing two feline office assistants and calling on a big network of talented designers, illustrators, web developers, photographers and printers.
I've been a writer, editor and journalist for 30 years. I worked full time for the magazines:
and for the website bounty.com.
On Running magazine, I introduced a number of editorial and support features, many of which – I'm proud to say – still exist today in Running's successor Runner's World. They included the charities review, an annual shoe survey, the Running Sisters support network for women runners, equipment reviews, and the events listings. This was all in the early eighties before the convenience of email, database and Google.
For bounty.com, a leading pregnancy and parenting site, I turned 80,000 printed words into more than 500 web reference pages. This included sub-editing and text formatting. I kept these pages up to date, and helped to develop Bounty's in-house content management system. I also commissioned and wrote features on new subjects and updated the news pages daily.
I've written two books: Running Together (Allen & Unwin, 1985) told the story of the Running Sisters Network and inspired women who wanted to start running but didn't know where to begin.
I wrote Plain Words for Nurses (Foundation of Nursing Studies, 2001) to help nurses (and other health professionals) talk about their practice more clearly. In 2002, this book won me first prize in the Medical Journalists' Association awards for excellence in medical journalism.
I've also edited many medical and nursing textbooks for Elsevier, Blackwell, The King's Fund and Quay Books, among others.
I launched fit to print in 2001. Originally I focused on my specialist topics of health, fitness and sport. You'll see from my testimonials that I have branched out a bit since then! I relish the challenge of tackling completely new subjects, and I often think that being a non-specialist has its advantages. I can put myself in the readers' shoes and ask the questions they ask.
I'm an Advanced – and active – member of the Society for Editors and Proofreaders, which has two aims:
In 1998 I moved from my native London with my family to live and work in the northern Lake District. My work is inspired by beautiful scenery and lovely local food, and I pack many more hours into the working day.
Contact me now to find out how I can help you make your content fit to print.