Languages and writing were always my favourites at school. Coming from a small town in North Nottinghamshire, discovering how people in other countries communicated and perceived the world around them seemed impossibly exotic. On top of that, I'm quite an introverted person by nature and have always communicated better and more freely in writing. I like to think that my flowing prose makes up for my lack of flair in oral communications, at least up to a point.

In the summer of 2007 I packed my bags at very short notice and left the UK for the sunnier climes of Germany. Since then, I have been continuously employed as an in-house translator at two agencies.

The first of these was a small company in Heidelberg, where I concentrated on translation four days a week and stood in for the project manager every Friday (which often entailed delivering large translation jobs in multiple language pairs). The largest customer was a leading company in the print industry, although over the years an increasing number of advertising agencies also got on board.

After more than ten years there, I moved on to my second agency in Darmstadt, where I am still employed. The main focus of the work here is the chemical industry, although I also translate contracts, marketing texts and employee magazines.