{"id":2845,"date":"2018-11-02T12:19:26","date_gmt":"2018-11-02T01:49:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/?p=2845"},"modified":"2018-11-15T10:48:38","modified_gmt":"2018-11-15T00:18:38","slug":"behind-books-meet-events-guru-maddy-sexton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/2018\/11\/behind-books-meet-events-guru-maddy-sexton\/","title":{"rendered":"Behind the Books: Meet events guru Maddy Sexton"},"content":{"rendered":"

In this weekly series, we take you behind the scenes to get a glimpse of the glamorous life\u00a0at Adelaide’s premier publishing house. This week, meet our events guru, editorial assistant and all-round office doer\u00a0<\/em>Maddy Sexton<\/strong>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Maddy<\/p>\n

What made you want to work in publishing \u2013 and how did you get your start?
\n<\/strong>I wanted to work in publishing since I was about eight, which seems like a lie, but I have a whole collection of \u2018published\u2019 work hidden in my parent\u2019s garage with thrilling stories including \u2018The Adventures of Starfish\u2019, a story about a starfish (named Starfish) who goes out one day and then comes home (that\u2019s the entire story), among other things. I\u2019d write, illustrate, and bind all of my stories and tell anyone who would listen that one day I would be an author.<\/p>\n

I actually came to be in publishing very much by accident, mainly because I never thought I\u2019d be able to crack into the field. A friend of mine used to work at Wakefield Press, and when she got a job in Melbourne, she suggested that I go for the role, and the rest is history. I\u2019m very lucky to be here!<\/p>\n

What does your typical day at Wakefield Press involve?<\/strong>
\nIt\u2019s a lot of reading \u2013 emails make up most of my material, but I also do a bit of proofreading and editing bits and pieces that come across my desk. My main job is events coordination, so the rest of my day is usually filled with organising book launches and other events for our authors. The rest of the time I\u2019m trying to keep the bookshop stocked up and looking nice, which helps to break up my work a little bit.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the most absurd or surprising thing that\u2019s ever happened to you on the job?<\/strong>
\nI\u2019ve only been here for a year, so I don\u2019t have any exciting stories really! My biggest surprise was getting the job, followed closely by finding out just how glamorous it is to work in publishing! It\u2019s kind of funny sometimes answering the phone and having a conversation with someone which seems to be quite normal and relaxed, and then just before they hang up you find out you\u2019ve been talking to a TV network producer without even knowing it!<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the best thing about working in publishing?
\n<\/strong>The best thing for me is being able to work on lots of different books in (usually) really small ways, and knowing that although I might not have been credited in the book, I still had something to do with bringing the book into the world. It\u2019s very satisfying, especially if the book was difficult to work on!<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the worst thing about working in publishing?
\n<\/strong>The constant suspicion that I\u2019m not meant to be in publishing, and that someone will walk in and say \u2018Hey, what are you doing? You\u2019re not meant to be here!\u2019 and kick me out. Otherwise it\u2019s great!<\/p>\n

What kinds of things do you love to discover in a book (on the job or as a reader)?<\/strong>I love when there\u2019s a little \u2018A-ha!\u2019 moment in books, where the penny finally drops for you as the reader but might not have dropped yet for the characters. Also, I love weird humour (I read too much Lemony Snicket as a kid), so it\u2019s always good to find a ridiculously placed bit of comedy in a book.<\/p>\n

What books are on your bedside table right now?
\n<\/strong>It\u2019s embarrassing but my bedside table is really just a ridiculously tall stack of unread books that I keep adding to in moments of weakness. One day it will get so tall that I can\u2019t get out of bed, but I\u2019ll probably still add to it. Margaret Atwood\u2019s The Edible Woman<\/em> is on top, along with The Architecture of Happiness<\/em> by Alain de Botton. I finished Haruki Murakami\u2019s 1Q84<\/em> recently, which I really enjoyed \u2013 one less on the stack!<\/p>\n

Keep up to date on the Wakefield Press crew’s day-to-day activities by following us on Instagram!<\/a> Maddy will be posting pictures, videos and polls to our stories every day. Visit us online<\/a> or in store at 16 Rose street, Mile End, to see us all in the flesh.<\/em><\/h1>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this weekly series, we take you behind the scenes to get a glimpse of the glamorous life\u00a0at Adelaide’s premier publishing house. This week, meet our events guru, editorial assistant and all-round office doer\u00a0Maddy Sexton. What made you want to … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[553,80,5,808,90,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2845","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adelaide","category-for-fun","category-wordpress-defaults","category-interview","category-publisher-profile","category-we-love-books"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4v1Of-JT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2845"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2845\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2870,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2845\/revisions\/2870"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wakefieldpress.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}