Holly Marlow is an author and a parent to biological and adopted children. Holly strives for a gentle/therapeutic parenting style and this has led her to create stories to help children to understand some of the emotional and practical complexities of foster care, kinship care and adoption.

Holly enjoys spending time with her family, travelling (especially searching for chameleons, geckos and snakes in the wild parts of Africa) and learning foreign languages. Holly has fibromyalgia and has spent a lot of time trying to raise awareness of the chronic pain condition, giving presentations in schools and universities. Holly also enjoys baking and gardening, although she is terrible at both.

Foster Care, Kinship Care and Adoption Advocacy

In addition to creating stories to help children, Holly has helped many adoptees to publish their stories, providing coaching, editing services and cover design for no payment, royalty or requirement to be credited in the book. If you are an adoptee and would like Holly to help you navigate the publishing process, she will support you for no charge.

Holly has also provided many talks to primary schools, to help children to learn about foster care, kinship care and adoption. Read more about Holly’s school visits here.

The profits from Holly’s foster care, adoption and social work related notebooks are donated to Home for Good, a charity dedicated to finding a home for every child who needs one.

Career

After graduating from Keele University with a dual honours degree in German and Management Science, Holly spent 13 years working in the Aerospace and Defence industry in various roles in commercial/contract management.

Holly’s first book “Delly Duck” came to life while she was having discussions with her daughter about adopting a younger sibling. Holly’s daughter asked a lot of questions about all aspects of the process, but the thing she really struggled with was the separation of a child from his or her mother. She rightly identified that this must be a difficult and distressing aspect of adoption, and couldn’t understand why a mother and child would or should ever be separated. Holly wanted to support this empathy towards the birth mother, while gently showing that the decision to remove a child from their mother would not have been taken lightly. Above all, Holly wanted to portray that all adults involved wanted the best for Little Chick, and that he is so very loved. 

“Delly Duck” has now won three “Book Authority” awards, including “Best Adoption Books of All Time,” and Holly’s books have been Bestsellers in many Amazon categories in the UK, US, Canada, Australia, Germany, Spain and Japan.

Chronic Pain Advocacy

Holly is diagnosed with a chronic pain condition called fibromyalgia and has previously been interviewed for YouTube video “Living with Fibromyalgia,” which won a video contest to be aired as a Public Service Announcement in the USA to raise awareness about fibromyalgia, and has been used by university lecturers in the UK to educate trainee nurses.

Holly has previously given presentations in schools and at universities to raise awareness of chronic invisible illnesses, including Fibromyalgia, Lyme disease, M.E., Systemic Lupus Erythematosus, Multiple Sclerosis, Ankylosing Spondylitis and Complex Regional Pain Syndrome.