Johnny Acton

Recent clients have included:

Olivier Mythodrama (extensively rewriting website and brochure text)

Addison Lee (devising print advertisements for a Christmas campaign)

Volvo (writing articles for VQ magazine)

I was called in to help out with this book because Macca couldn't think of anything to say in the introductions to the recipes. I have also ghost-written as a Thai chef, a Dutch fishing magnate, three brothers from Sussex and HRH The Prince of Wales.

Recent projects have included:

Copy Editing Built for Speed, the autobiography of the TT racer John McGuinness (best-selling sports biography on Amazon at the time of writing)

Copy Editing China’s Media, a survey of that country’s media scene by the head of the University of Westminster’s China Media Centre.

Proofreading The Moth - All These Wonders, published by Serpent’s Tale, April 2017

Soup Works was a chain of gourmet soup bars which I co-founded in the West End of London in the late 90s. I became the Marketing Director, which was an intense course in branding, copywriting, advertising, PR and so forth. 

I co-wrote this to promote Prince Charles’s Organic Food business. I also ghost-wrote the foreword for him.

This was a guide to London 2012 aimed primarily at the army of non-sports fans who we correctly anticipated would be drawn into the excitement surrounding the Games. It was number one in the WH Smith non-fiction chart and Guardian, Observer and Independent Sports Book of the Year. Updated version published in 2016 for Rio Games.

The story of super high altitude ballooning and its largely forgotten role in the early days of the Space Race.

This is a book I co-wrote to accompany the first documentary series ever commissioned by China's state television (CCTV) from a production company based outside The People's Republic. It is about changes and upheavals in the West. 

I have written regular columns for various magazines, including 'Brand Focus' for IP Review and 'Where Are They Now?' for the influential 90s foodie mag EatSoup. My articles have appeared in publications ranging from The New Statesman and The Literary Review to Penthouse UK. and have included several celebrity interviews.

The genesis of everything from bubblewrap to roller skates.

For many years I wrote obituaries for The Times, the 'newspaper of record'. The subjects were often extremely famous and condensing their lives into a thousand words or less was quite an art. Accuracy was paramount.

My latest offering, co-written with two friends, is a cross between a conventional travel guide and a history book. Not only does it whisk you back in time to the beheading of Charles I and the Rumble in the Jungle; it also tells you where to eat and spend the night.

My brief here was essentially to amuse Intellectual Property lawyers sitting on the loo. The IP Consultancy CPA Global commissioned 40,000 copies of this book to give to its clients as a Christmas present.

This was a perky little illustrated book about money. The fun side of numismatics, if you will.

Written to help out parents beleaguered by nine year olds asking “Mum, what’s a credit crunch?”

After the success of the Duchy Originals Cookbook, my chef friend and I decided to write a book about a selection of the world’s greatest food brands.

Co-written with the current William Hill Sportswriter of the Year, this was an illustrated encyclopedia of the world's biggest sport.