Jane Helen Hodgkinson

Jane Helen Hodgkinson grew up in London. Her family holidays took her to many British beaches where her love of rocks and geology was first realised. At the age of 16 she began a career in merchant banking and the commodity markets, but much later, Jane revisited her passion, enrolling in a part-time geology degree at Birkbeck College. After graduating she moved on to a PhD when she moved to Queensland, Australia, setting herself up for her second career, as a geologist.

In spite of her passion for writing poems and short stories, her publication record has been overtaken by scientific publications. Through Jane's work as a research scientist, she was extraordinarily fortunate to be invited by Professor Frank D. Stacey to co-author an Earth science book The Earth as a Cradle for Life that was published in 2013 by World Scientific Press. Cradle describes the physics of the environment and attempts to put in to context the Earth as it is today, based on how it has been and how it may become. Later, Frank and Jane also co-authored a second book, The Practical Handbook of Earth Science, that was published by CRC Press in 2017. Following publication of a scientific journal paper that Frank and Jane wrote on thermodynamics, Jane was inspired to write a simplified introduction to the subject: Thermodynamics the Budgie, which she has dedicated to Frank who remains an inspiration to her writing.

As a scientist, much of Jane's work has concentrated on problems and opportunities presented to the mining industry by climate change, seeking value from discarded materials and resources on the Moon and Mars for extended space missions. As a writer, her aim is to publish flash fiction and picture books for children and adults, mainly for a bit of fun, but if they she can educate too, even better.