Lorna Collier's Bio
I'm a writer and
editor living near
Rockford, Ill., which is 80 miles west of Chicago. Prior to starting my
freelance career in 1992, I worked as a daily newspaper reporter for
the Rockford Register Star, a medium-sized Gannett daily; as a magazine
editor and writer for the now-defunct Rockford Magazine, also owned by
Gannett; and as a television news producer/assistant assignment editor
for WTVO-TV, the NBC
affiliate in Rockford, Ill.
I hold a
bachelor's degree, magna cum laude, from Northern Illinois
University, DeKalb, where I majored in English and minored in
journalism.
My freelance
work in recent years has been for newspapers,
magazines, and websites, including Smithsonian magazine, Bottom
Line/Health, MSN.com, ATT.net, ClassesUSA.com, Smart Computing
magazine, PC Novice magazine, and others. I've written numerous
education articles for the
National
Council of Teachers of English's member magazine, The Council
Chronicles, and have written a variety of business stories for Crain's
Chicago Business magazine. As a member of the Public Access Journalism
team, I wrote a childhood obesity package for
Knight-Ridder Tribune, which was funded by the
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and which was picked up by many
national newspapers and websites, ranging from the Miami Herald to the
Philadelphia Inquirer to the San Jose Mercury News. I've also written
extensively for the Chicago
Tribune, including numerous full-length cover features for the
now-defunct Health & Family section, and also have contributed
lengthy features to
the Womanews and Tempo sections. An article I wrote about adoption for
the Chicago Tribune was picked up for reprint in the Contemporary
Issues Companion series called Adoption, published by Thomson Gale in
2006.
Please see the Articles section of this
website for samples of my writing.
Additionally, I've written a successful grant application for a private
school, brochure copy for the Rockford Golden Apple Foundation, and
newsletter copy for the Rockford Chamber of Commerce, plus I recently
edited a 144-page book for the Boone County Historical Society.
Several years
ago, I wrote a book called "Tilli's
Story: My Thoughts Are Free," about the life of
Tilli Schulze, who grew
up in a small East German farming village during World War II and the
subsequent Russian occupation. The book was selected
by iUniverse for its exclusive Star
imprint in 2005 and recently won an
honorable
mention in the memoir category from the Independent Publishers
Association. In support of this book, I have been speaking, along with
Tilli Schulze, to many different kinds of groups throughout Illinois
and
Wisconsin, ranging from teacher associations to schools to book clubs.
I also am available to speak about the craft of memoir-writing and the
ins and outs of self-publishing through print on demand.
To download my full resume in Word format, click here.
I look forward
to hearing from you!