Nice to meet you! A bit about me:

Jessica Lauren Walton is a communications strategist, video producer, and writer in the U.S. defense sector. She has written articles on a range of security and mental health topics and conducted interviews with military leadership, law enforcement, CIA officers, psychologists, filmmakers, and more. She has a master’s degree in security intelligence and a passion for unearthing unique human-interest stories in the security field.

Raised in an orthodox Jewish community in the Washington, D.C. area, Jessica immigrated to Israel as a teenager during the Second Intifada. During her studies as an English Literature major at Bar Ilan University, she met several Israeli commandos who convinced her that her time would be better spent working for the Israeli security community.

After completing her literature degree, Jessica returned to the U.S. and graduated from the University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs with a Masters in Security Intelligence. She continued her graduate studies at the Hebrew University’s Political Violence and Terrorism Department in Jerusalem while working for a private homeland security firm run by former members of Shin Bet.
 
As a freelancer in the Israeli security community, Jessica specialized in asymmetric warfare, psychological operations, and national security policy, while writing articles, speeches, policy papers, and two books (if anyone ever tells you an English Lit degree is useless…) She then joined the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), serving in the Division of Doctrine and Training at the Operations Directorate. Following her military service, she continued working in private security in Israel and Transylvania.
 
Jessica returned to the Washington, D.C. area in 2017. When she's not busy with her day job, she blogs, cleans up toys from her living room floor, and hangs out with the local film community as a member of the Women in Film & Video (WIFV) organization.  

Jessica recently completed a memoir about her experience as an American woman struggling with mental illness while trying to gain acceptance into the Israeli security community. If you are an agent or publishing house interested in viewing the manuscript, please contact Jessica at jess@jessicawaltonwriter.com.

(For all other inquiries...ok who am I kidding, I just have this one business email, so you can still email me at jess@jessicawaltonwriter.com.)