[9] In 1987, she became editorial director of Jonathan Cape[13] and was featured in "The Powers That Will Be – We Choose the People Who Will Run Britain In the Nineties"[14] in The Sunday Times Magazine.

[17] She continued to edit and publish authors including Edward Said (Culture and Imperialism);[18] Salman Rushdie (The Moor's Last Sigh)[19][20][21] and John Pilger[22](A Secret Country).

[2][25] In 2000, Coady moved to New York to become the publisher of Picador USA,[26] an imprint of the Macmillan Group, which she turned into a paperback house with bestsellers and award-winning authors including Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay;[27] Per Petterson's Out Stealing Horses,[28] Edmund De Waal's The Hare with Amber Eyes[29] and Edward St Aubyn's Patrick Melrose Novels.

[30] She also published Frances Coady Books within Henry Holt and Farrar Straus & Giroux,[31] including Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine;[32][33] Richard Powers' Generosity[34] and; Andrew Sean Greer's The Confessions of Max Tivoli.

[39] Atavist Books launched in 2014 with Karen Russell's Sleep Donation[40] As a literary agent at Aragi, Coady's authors include: Sharon Olds; Claudia Rankine; Ocean Vuong; Michael Cunningham, and Rebecca Solnit.