Anna Sullivan

Anna graduated from UTSC with an English and Philosophy double major. She also achieved a Master’s degree in English Literature from York University and a Certificate in Publishing from Ryerson’s Chang School of Continuing Education. She currently works in the publishing industry as a Marketing Coordinator for Harlequin. She is also a career-mentor with Ryerson and always happy to lend advice to students looking to break into the industry.

 

During her academic career Anna studied a wide variety of literature but always gravitated back to the spooky, scary, strange, thanks in large part to prof. Sonja Nikkila and her Gothic Lit class. Her MA research project examined at the emergence of “urban gothic” literature amidst sanitary and social concerns of 1850s England. She has presented her work at UTSC’s Humanities Conferences as well as the Sigma Tau Delta Convention in Albuquerque, NM. Shout out also goes to professor’s Maria Assif and Andrew Westoll for providing her with invaluable advice and opportunities over the years.

 

After completing academia, she followed her passion and pursued work in the publishing industry. While completing an intensive publishing certificate at Ryerson she secured two back-to-back internships at Penguin Random House Canada where she got the opportunity to work with big name authors like Zadie Smith and Margaret Atwood and contribute to advertising campaigns for David Chariandy and Jodi Picoult among many others. She currently works for Harlequin in an emerging field of Backlist marketing. She spends her days hunting down new marketing trends, building campaigns, and finding new & creative ways to market books that are 1 year old or older. (In trade publishing, most marketing efforts focus on books coming out in the current year.) She feels lucky to have a job that pushes her to think creatively every day and she commends Harlequin for their amazing workplace culture. But she knows that making it into any industry is hard work, over the last couple years she has honed her networking and relationship-building skills to her advantage, skills she now passes on to her student mentees. Anna is excited to continue finding her voice in the industry and helping others do the same.

 

“My advice to students – think hard about what you have to offer and what you’re most passionate about, be confident about your unique abilities, then get out there and network! The more people who know who know you and understand what you bring to the table the better your chances will be at finding a career you love AND excel at.”