Being a journalist is still one of the best jobs in the world. Tomorrow, you could be interviewing anyone and writing about anything – and that’s exciting for a curious mind.
So even though I work as a copywriter and copy-editor, I also offer feature writing – drawing on my years of experience as a writer for magazines, websites and broadsheets.
If you need a freelance journalist who can write reliably and with life, get in touch.
My experience
I’ve worked as a staff journalist on the Guardian website, and as a sub-editor in the medical trade press.
After going freelance, I wrote features for titles such as the Guardian, the Observer, the Telegraph and Sunday Times Travel; and for the customer magazines of banks, insurers, travel organisations, and more.
I’ve written on countless topics over the years. Here are a few:
Work and HR. Careers, higher education, life choices, and the changing world of work.
Business and innovation. Technology (B2B and B2C), startups, marketing – and how to innovate through it all.
European travel. Beaches, cities, rail trips, rural escapes, food, drink, festivals – in Greece, Cyprus, Spain, France, Croatia, UK, Malta, Sweden, etc.
Lifestyle and how-to. Students, shoppers, New Year’s resolution breakers, crossword solvers: all have benefited from my light-hearted yet practical advice.
And more. Renewable energy, genealogy, marathon running, 90s music – I’ve covered them all. Try me.
Journalism cuttings
Here are a few examples of my work:
Interview with business guru Tom Peters, for a Grant Thornton magazine
"Tom Peters is going back to basics. The American who practically invented the modern business book, back in 1982 when he wrote In Search of Excellence with his McKinsey co-author Robert Waterman, says he has had it with talk of ‘business models’ and ‘alignment of staff priorities’ and polysyllabic business jargon of the third kind …”
This feature, based on 20-minute interview, captured the essence of the straight-talking US business guru in an economically chastened world.
Please contact me at mail@chrisalden.co.uk to read the full article – or if you need an article that uses my set-piece interview skills.
10 tips on finances for expats, in the Observer
“Can’t decide whether to move abroad? No wonder. The papers are full of stories of expats caught by currency swings and falling property prices …”
This piece for the Observer’s Cash supplement showed that moving abroad can be rewarding – if you avoid the financial pitfalls.
Horse racing on the beach in Spain, for the Guardian website
“It’s Friday afternoon on a summer beach in Spain, and for half a mile in each direction holidaymakers are soaking up the sun. Children are building sandcastles, families are picnicking, and an old man on a motorised tricycle is hawking ice-cream to anyone who’ll buy. Only a low orange fence, placed along the length of the beach just yards from the water’s edge, hints at the spectacle to come …”
This Guardian web feature – for which I stayed as a guest of the Sherry Association of Spain – celebrated the beachside Carreras de Caballos de Sanlúcar, one of the oldest and strangest flat race meetings in the world.
The secret life of sheds, for a Lloyds TSB magazine
"When is a shed not a shed? When it’s a Roman temple, a miniature pub, a writer’s retreat, a replica Tardis, a meditation area – or any of the many other creative looks and uses people are giving to what was once just the humble little hideaway at the bottom of the garden ..."
While we Brits have always loved our sheds, there’s far more to sheds than potting, as this article by Chris Alden proved.
Please get in touch to read the whole piece.
How to get up in the morning, for a Guardian graduate careers supplement
"The shock, when it comes, is horrible. One minute you are a fully paid-up student, drinking subsidised beer, burning the midnight oil and getting up at a civilised hour – if not before the midday news, then at least before the Countdown Conundrum – and the next minute someone comes and takes it all away. Suddenly you're an employee; your time is not your own. There are people in the world who need you to get up. In the morning."
A fun Guardian piece I wrote back in the day, offering students 10 ways to reset their body clock – and adjust to working hours. (Would Gen Z even put up with it?)
I have plenty of other examples of my feature-writing on file, so please ask to see them if you need more info.
To find out more, just contact mail@chrisalden.co.uk.
