Meet the editor: Pam Wells

My family moved to Portland six weeks before the Willamette River flooded Main Street in Oregon City and half the cows in Tillamook floated out to sea. That was 1996. We’d come from Southern California, where rain was practically a myth.

I quickly learned to love the seasons here, even the dry one. The seasons have witnessed some of my better moments: singing for nine years in the Portland Opera Chorus; producing and editing a documentary film (My Shanghai, 2014); co-creating The Timberline Review, a literary journal, as Editor in Chief and book designer; and, most recently—because age is no excuse—attending the graduate program in book publishing at Portland State University. 

After two years of classes and working at Ooligan Press, the program’s trade publishing house, I earned my MA in Book Publishing in 2017. The teams I worked on published The Ocean in My Ears (November 2017) and 50 Hikes in the Tillamook & Clatsop State Forests (March 2018). My classes ran the gamut—developmental editing, editorial theory, design, typography, marketing, and, one of my favorites, book archaeology.

Since setting out as a freelance editor, I’ve worked closely with Jack Estes on his Vietnam War-era novel, Searching for Gurney, and with C.G. Lewis on his post-apocalyptic YA novel, Muck World. Author Joe McAvoy has often come to me for feedback to polish his work for publication in several literary magazines. I’ve enjoyed working with other writers to help move their projects forward. Please take a moment to read their testimonials.

It’s especially rewarding to see my clients’ work in print, but the process of getting there can be a blast.

We never know what the next season will bring. Keep working, keep writing, and let me know when you want someone to read your work.

Pictured left: Looking south on the Willamette River near Milwaukie, Oregon

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