Ruth Martin Indexing
Freelance professional book indexing and legal tabling services.
Hello, and welcome to my website! I am a freelance, professional book indexer and legal tabler. I have worked as part of Thomson Reuters’ Legal Journals Index team since 2004, so law is my specialist area. However, I have also indexed social sciences, economics and healthcare titles. A list of some of the titles I have indexed is included here, and the indexes themselves can be viewed using Amazon’s ‘Look Inside’ facility.
In 2021, I won the Institute of Certified Indexers’ Purple Pen Indexing Contest for newly accredited indexers for my index to All manner of ingenuity and industry: A bio-bibliography of Dr Thomas Willis (1621-1675), by Alastair Compston. Professor Comptson said about this:
I am delighted to learn that Ruth Martin has received this award. For a book with many recurring themes supported by a large number of facts and reference to individuals, it was important to have an accurate and comprehensive index. On receiving the draft, I was immediately reassured that Ruth had scrutinised the text with considerable attention to detail creating an imaginative, usable and extensive guide to the contents. Ruth also alerted me to inconsistencies and ambiguities in the narrative all of which improved the printed version. It was a pleasure to work with Ruth, and many other authors will benefit from her work in the future.
After graduating from Oxford University with a First in English Language and Literature, I trained as a librarian at Liverpool John Moores University. I then worked in the library of a large solicitors’ firm before becoming the Information Manager of a local law society and later of an independent healthcare publisher.
I love indexing not only because I have a tidy mind and enjoy making order out of chaos, but also because it is a highly creative occupation. That might seem strange, since the indexer is entirely constrained by the author’s text, but there is a distinct creative challenge in translating complex ideas into concise yet meaningful headings and then linking them to other ideas to create a coherent whole. I often think that indexes are not written but emerge.
These days, I live in the Gers, a remote and beautiful part of South-West France. Walks in the countryside are the perfect antidote to long hours spent in front of my computer.
In 2021, I won the Institute of Certified Indexers’ Purple Pen Indexing Contest for newly accredited indexers for my index to All manner of ingenuity and industry: A bio-bibliography of Dr Thomas Willis (1621-1675), by Alastair Compston. Professor Comptson said about this:
I am delighted to learn that Ruth Martin has received this award. For a book with many recurring themes supported by a large number of facts and reference to individuals, it was important to have an accurate and comprehensive index. On receiving the draft, I was immediately reassured that Ruth had scrutinised the text with considerable attention to detail creating an imaginative, usable and extensive guide to the contents. Ruth also alerted me to inconsistencies and ambiguities in the narrative all of which improved the printed version. It was a pleasure to work with Ruth, and many other authors will benefit from her work in the future.
After graduating from Oxford University with a First in English Language and Literature, I trained as a librarian at Liverpool John Moores University. I then worked in the library of a large solicitors’ firm before becoming the Information Manager of a local law society and later of an independent healthcare publisher.
I love indexing not only because I have a tidy mind and enjoy making order out of chaos, but also because it is a highly creative occupation. That might seem strange, since the indexer is entirely constrained by the author’s text, but there is a distinct creative challenge in translating complex ideas into concise yet meaningful headings and then linking them to other ideas to create a coherent whole. I often think that indexes are not written but emerge.
These days, I live in the Gers, a remote and beautiful part of South-West France. Walks in the countryside are the perfect antidote to long hours spent in front of my computer.
