My debut novel, What Time is Love?, was published as a lead title for Orion Fiction in 2022, and has sold in a further 13 countries around the world. It is a love story told over several decades that asks readers, ‘What if you met the right person at the wrong time?’ In 2020, I received funding from Arts Council England to complete the book.
What Time is Love? came out in paperback Febuary 2023, and my second novel, The Start of Something, was published in hardback by Orion in 2024. Offering a modern twist on Arthur Schnitzler’s La Ronde, it tells the story of ten characters via ten interlocking sexual encounters. It’s out in paperback in February 2025.
My agent in the UK is Tristan Kendrick at RCW literary agency. For TV and film queries, it’s Tanya Tillett at Casarotto.
I am also a freelance journalist specialising in the arts. I worked on staff at The Independent and The Independent on Sunday for six years. Since going freelance, I have written for the New York Times, The Guardian, the FT, Vogue, the New Statesman, The Sunday Times, Tatler, The Evening Standard, BBC Culture, ELLE, Stylist, Vice, The Stage, Elephant, Cosmopolitan and The Telegraph, and reviewed theatre and books for The Times, The Observer, the Times Literary Supplement, Time Out, The Mail on Sunday, What’s on Stage, The Independent and more.
In November 2024, I became the editor of Exeunt – relaunching the much-loved online but then defunct theatre magazine on Substack, and publishing fierce, playful, inventive, independent criticism by the sharpest theatre writers from across the country.
In 2018-19, I was acting arts editor for The Independent. I have provided cover for editors at The Observer and Time Out, as well as working shifts at Stylist and The Debrief.
Since 2023, I have been a judge for The Stage Debut Awards, and in 2019, I was a judge for the Evening Standard Theatre Awards. I have appeared on TV and radio programmes as an arts specialist, including Sky News, Radio 4’s Front Row and You and Yours, and NPR, and written programme notes and syndicated content for many theatres.
I’ve hosted and appeared on numerous literary podcasts, festivals and events as a guest, panel member, and as an interviewer or host, including You’re Booked, Intelligence Squared, Latitude Festival and Off the Shelf. I am available to interview and chair literary and cultural events of all kinds – just drop me an email.
My consulting work includes being an active associate for script-reading service Rough Hewn, offering feedback and dramaturgical support for playwrights. I have also planned and led workshops for Arts Emergency, Nottingham Trent University, the Faber Academy and Sheffield’s Writers Workshop.
In 2021, I was shortlisted for Art and Design Writer of the Year at the Freelance Writing Awards. In 2015, I received a Special Commendation in the Allen Wright Award for arts journalism at the Edinburgh festivals; I was also shortlisted in 2014 and 2016.
Contact me
- Get in touch: holly (at) hollywrites.com
- Contact my agent: tristan (at) rcwlitagency.com
- Follow me on Twitter: @Holly_bops
