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Louise is a member of the Editorial Freelancers Association.

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Louise is a an Amherst Writers & Artists (AWA) affiliate, certified to lead workshops in the AWA method.

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About Louise

When Louise was ten, she attended a typing course in the restored chicken coop of a Pennsylvania bank barn. Once she’d mastered typing on a 1930’s era manual typewriter, she moved on to creating newsletters and writing short stories. At the local yacht club, she interviewed fishermen, as well as the chief of police, wrote up their stories, and included them in a newsletter, along with stories about the weather and the yacht club parties. In the wintertime, she created family newsletters, full of stories and word puzzles. Using carbon paper, she created duplicates and mailed them to relatives.

Louise continued writing into her teens and won her first short story contest in the eighth grade. However, writing by herself, with no one to read her work, wasn’t satisfying. At fifteen, she attended Mercyhurst College Summer Writers’ Institute. Louise learned how to write for a wide audience, as well as how to evaluate, critique, and edit her peers' work. She attended her first open mic and read a story to a roomful of her peers. By the end of the summer program, she vowed to take the necessary steps to be a writer.

That winter Louise wrote a short story that won her a scholarship to return to Mercyhurst College Summer Writers’ Institute for another summer. She was overjoyed to have a chance to continue perfecting her writing and editing skills.

Louise knew that The University of Iowa was one of the country’s top writing colleges, famous for its Writers’ Workshop. She applied early, was accepted in September, then, while the rest of her high school classmates were writing college essays, she returned to writing short stories.

At The University of Iowa, Louise was selected into the very competitive Undergraduate Writers’ Workshop. During her senior year, she completed her first novel, with the encouragement of a Writers’ Workshop mentor.

Louise completed an English major, then, finding that the study of French literature contributed to her knowledge of how to write good stories, added French as a second major.  In her spare time, she hosted an open mic night where other writers could present their work.

After graduation, Louise followed the advice of Frank Conroy, then-director of the Writers’ Workshop to “take a job, any job that won’t physically/emotionally exhaust you and leaves you with the energy to write,” and continued working on her novel in the evenings and on weekends.

At the suggestion of a Writers’ Workshop friend, Louise moved to Berkeley, CA where she took a series of temp jobs (including a stint at McGraw-Hill) while continuing to write novels in her free time. She joined a writer’s group and hosted an open mic night at Boadecia’s Books in Kensington, California.

In 1997, her first novel was a finalist for The Heekin Group Foundation Writer’s & Education Fund. 

Recent Projects

In 2001, Louise moved to Media, PA, a town outside of Philadelphia.  She worked in-house for Elsevier Science followed by Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins. On her first day at Elsevier, Louise met a freelance developmental editor and decided this was the career for her. Freelancing would give her the freedom to balance her editorial work with her own writing. In 2004, she started her writing and editing business and has been freelancing ever since.  At the time, Louise worked alongside her cat, Vela, and named her business Feline Friendly Freelance.

Louise’s areas of specialty include: Fiction, Memoir, Medical, Nursing, and ESL materials. She enjoys helping authors with learning disabilities express themselves and especially likes working with first-time authors and helping them develop their craft.  Since 2001, she has developed over 100 book projects. Her clients include major publishers, as well as individual authors.

In Philadelphia, Louise hosted The Women’s Writing and Spoken Word Series, joined another writer’s group, and taught courses on Fiction Writing at community centers. 

In 2004, Louise’s second novel was a finalist in a novel writing contest sponsored by Suspect Thoughts Press.

Her personal narratives have been published in The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Swarthmorean, Lansdowne Fresh Picks newsletter, and Soul Source's newsletter. 

Louise is a member of the Editorial Freelancers Association and is an Amherst Writers and Artists affiliate, certified to lead workshops in the AWA method.