All about Me
The granddaughter of a librarian, Ellie Sipila has always made books a big part of her life. Reading, yes, but also writing – Ellie’s career in publishing began on the author’s side of the desk. At the time, the common practice for an aspiring author to gain clout and followers was to publish some short pieces in literary publications to build an author portfolio before approaching agents and publishers, so that’s what Ellie did. Once she had about ten pieces of published short fiction under her belt, she began to submit longer works, three of which found homes with various traditional publishers.
During this time she met and connected with a number of other aspiring authors and found while beta reading for them that she had an interest in editing. So she enrolled in Ryerson University’s Publishing Certificate Program, where she took every course on editing that was available at the time (and there were a lot!). After completing those courses, she did an editorial internship in the children’s department of Fitzhenry and Whiteside Ltd. in Markham, Ontario. While there, she discovered she harboured a deep love for design and production as well, so when her internship was complete, while working as an in-house editor at a small (now defunct) publishing house, she went back to Ryerson to pursue skills in those areas too.
Ellie opened her own freelance company, Move to the Write, in 2013. She began doing primarily editing but soon opened her services up to design and production as well. Move to the Write kept her quite busy until 2017, when she was hired by Second Story Press in Toronto, Ontario, to complete a one-year travel leave coverage contract as the in-house design and production manager.
During this time, another small business Ellie opened as a labour of love – Common Deer Press, an independent book publisher – began to take off. Originally publishing only four titles per year (Ellie was doing this completely solo and that was all she was able to realistically take on while also having to do annoying things like earn a living), the company had matured enough to boast some award-winning titles and had even gained the interest of some movie producers. In short, the company had grown quite a bit, and Ellie was unable to continue doing it on her own. So she entrusted the company to a good friend (a writer but also a darn good accountant and business manager), and Ellie stepped down from her roles there in January 2019 to focus on her family and freelance work. (Common Deer Press is still going strong and you should definitely check it out!)
Though Ellie does still write (obviously!), these days her primary focus is on editing, design, and production. Ellie is one of the few production people who can create epubs completely from scratch, and fixing epubs tends to keep her quite busy. She also works full-time as a production editor at a large research company in Ontario, Canada.
During this time she met and connected with a number of other aspiring authors and found while beta reading for them that she had an interest in editing. So she enrolled in Ryerson University’s Publishing Certificate Program, where she took every course on editing that was available at the time (and there were a lot!). After completing those courses, she did an editorial internship in the children’s department of Fitzhenry and Whiteside Ltd. in Markham, Ontario. While there, she discovered she harboured a deep love for design and production as well, so when her internship was complete, while working as an in-house editor at a small (now defunct) publishing house, she went back to Ryerson to pursue skills in those areas too.
Ellie opened her own freelance company, Move to the Write, in 2013. She began doing primarily editing but soon opened her services up to design and production as well. Move to the Write kept her quite busy until 2017, when she was hired by Second Story Press in Toronto, Ontario, to complete a one-year travel leave coverage contract as the in-house design and production manager.
During this time, another small business Ellie opened as a labour of love – Common Deer Press, an independent book publisher – began to take off. Originally publishing only four titles per year (Ellie was doing this completely solo and that was all she was able to realistically take on while also having to do annoying things like earn a living), the company had matured enough to boast some award-winning titles and had even gained the interest of some movie producers. In short, the company had grown quite a bit, and Ellie was unable to continue doing it on her own. So she entrusted the company to a good friend (a writer but also a darn good accountant and business manager), and Ellie stepped down from her roles there in January 2019 to focus on her family and freelance work. (Common Deer Press is still going strong and you should definitely check it out!)
Though Ellie does still write (obviously!), these days her primary focus is on editing, design, and production. Ellie is one of the few production people who can create epubs completely from scratch, and fixing epubs tends to keep her quite busy. She also works full-time as a production editor at a large research company in Ontario, Canada.
