Staff Profiles

Sarah's areas of teaching focus are marketing, PR and consumer insights, as well as fiction and non-fiction

Modules taught

U65000: Publishing Principles

U65022: Sales and Marketing for Publishing

P65023: Sales, Marketing and Consumer Insights

P65016: Fiction and Non-Fiction

P65060: Sales and Marketing for Publishing (distance learning)

Sarah has also previously taught on U65001: Publishing Principles 2: From author to reader

Supervision

Sarah supervises undergraduate and postgraduate research in the areas of marketing/PR and fiction/non-fiction, including children's/YA fiction

In addition to her teaching role at Oxford Brookes, Sarah is a novelist; her debut, SHELTER, was published in 2017 by Bonnier Zaffre. Her practice informs both her teaching and her research. In terms of research she's interested in the role of consumer literature in a multi-platform world, and the evolution of promotional techniques. Sarah is also particularly interested in effective use of technology to enhance learning for diverse student cohorts. 

Research grants and awards

Sarah was the recipient of the 2014/15 Jerwood/Arvon Emerging Writers mentorship scheme, working with the novelist Jenn Ashworth on matters relating to her first novel. 

Research projects

Sarah is currently working on her second novel.

Research impact

Sarah's debut novel has been made widely available. Sarah has attended countrywide events in the promotion of SHELTER and discussing the nature of research-driven fiction. 

Books

• Franklin S, HOW TO BELONG, Bonnier Books UK (2020)
  ISBN: 9781785764868 eISBN: 9781785764851
  Abstract

  In the follow up to her acclaimed novel Shelter, Sarah Franklin returns to the Forest of Dean, this time exploring what it means to belong to a rural community in a rapidly changing world.

  Jo grew up in the Forest of Dean, but she was always the one destined to leave for a bigger, brighter future. When her parents retire from their butcher's shop, she returns to her beloved community to save the family legacy, hoping also to save herself. But things are more complex than the rose-tinted version of life which sustained Jo from afar.

  Tessa is a farrier, shoeing horses two miles and half a generation away from Jo, further into the forest. Tessa's experience of the community couldn't be more different. Now she too has returned, in flight from a life she could have led, nursing a secret and a past filled with guilt and shame.

  Compelled through circumstance to live together, these two women will be forced to confront their sense of identity, and reconsider the meaning of home.

• Franklin S, Shelter, Bonnier Zaffre (2017)
  ISBN: 9781785762994
  Abstract

  Led here by necessity, she knows she cannot stay. Brought against his will, he never wants to leave.

  Early spring 1944. Connie Granger has escaped her bombed-out city home, finding refuge in the Women's Timber Corps. For her, this remote community must now serve a secret purpose.
  

  Seppe, an Italian prisoner of war, is haunted by his memories. In the forest camp, he finds a strange kind of freedom.
  

  Their meeting signals new beginnings. But as they are drawn together, the world outside their forest haven is being torn apart. Old certainties are crumbling, and both must now make a life-defining choice.
  

  What price will they pay for freedom? What will they fight to protect?
  

  A captivating and tender novel about love, hope and how we find solace in the most troubled times.
  

  Website 

Areas of expertise

Marketing, PR, fiction, non-fiction writing and publishing 

Membership of professional bodies

Sarah has written for the Guardian, the Irish Times, the Sunday Express, www.the-pool.co.uk, Psychologies magazine, and the Seattle Times. 

Sarah is a judge of the Costa Short Story Award.

Consultancy

Sarah consults as part of the Oxford International Centre for Publishing Studies

Other experience

Prior to joining Oxford Brookes, Sarah lived and worked in publishing in London, the US, and Dublin, in a variety of sales and marketing roles within trade publishing.