The Extraordinary Business Book Club

Fresh (if you can call it that) from the Frankfurter Buchmesse 2025, I'm here this week with a candid look at what we and other publishers were talking about over those three hectic days - global sales, routes to market, Amazon and its new algorithm, AI, digital library platforms, translation rights and the evolution of metadata - and what all of that means for authors.  Plus why I HAD to go and have a good time each night - publishing runs on ideas, caffeine and relationships, and the Frankfurt Book Fair delivers all of these in spades. 

'At some point, the right to be you ends and your obligation to others begins.' 'Just be yourself.' It's the most uncontroversial advice in the world, right?  Wrong, says Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic. He's a man who likes to pick fights with universally accepted truths, because of course they're almost always more nuanced than we like to think.  In his new book Don't Be Yourself, he points out that unfiltered authenticity is a privilege reserved for the powerful, and it's not just selfish and a terrible career move for the rest of us but also limits our potential - because we grow by exploring our future possible selves, not just repeating who we've always been. He's also a man with a nuanced opinion of writing: simultaneously 'the best way of... actually organizing your thoughts' and 'a lonely, slow, and occasionally masochistic pursuit, like knitting, except with more existential dread and less wool.' I think we can all relate to this. 

 'At the lowest end of what a business book could be is, yes, it's a calling card... [But] what if your book was transformational?' Parul Bavishi - editor, former literary scout, co-founder of the London Writers' Salon and host of the Writers' Hour podcast - knows something about the realities of writing and the power of creative community. Writing can be a lonely business, but in the LWS's regular 'Writers' Hour' Parul has seen the extraordinary power of 'body doubling' - simply watching others write can be all the encouragement and support a writer needs to get unstuck. And there are even more potent aspects of community such as accountability and critique that can take your writing to the next level. We also talk about the genius that is the five-minute outline, the agony that is finishing and shipping a book, and how to ensure that your nonfiction book clearly sets out (and fulfils) a promise of transformation to the reader. Because if you're going to put all that time and emotional labour into writing a book, you might as well make it one that changes people's lives.

' Nobody cares about you until you show that you understand their problem, their situation, and you care about them.' As a former international speaker bureau owner, Maria Franzoni knows exactly what it takes to become a highly sought-after (and well-paid) speaker. In this week’s conversation, she reveals what speaker bookers are really looking for, and you might be surprised to discover that how well you speak is only one factor in her brilliant Bookability Formula. We talk about the interplay and overlap between being a speaker and being an author, and the way in which books support speaking so beautifully, and vice versa. (But it has to be the right book - Maria spent months of her life writing the wrong one so you don’t have to.) If you want to land more speaking gigs, if you’re not afraid to hear what that takes, and if you want to write the right book to support all of that, you probably shouldn’t miss this.

 'You need to kind of kick off this persuasive chain reaction and enlist people to the cause of your book.' In the book trade, James Spackman is known as 'The Pitch Doctor'. From an illustrious start to his career in the post room at Bloomsbury to sales, marketing and agency roles at Hachette, Osprey and now The bks Agency, his passion has always been to communicate a passion for books.  As he explains, the success of a book depends in large part of a 'chain of enthusiasm' that has to begin with the author and ultimately - hopefully - reaches the reader through a complex ecosystem of agents, editors, sales reps, marketers and booksellers. This is the art of the pitch, and because it ends with the reader, that's where the crafting of it must begin too.  In this week's conversation we discuss the fact that publishing is 'a business of persuasion rather than a meritocracy of texts', and what that means for authors. We also talk about the extraordinary route that James took to publish his own book, why measures of success are deeply personal, and why doing things your way is so damn rewarding. 

When she started her first job reporting on farming, trying to work out how to move into interior design, Sally Percy had no idea she'd forge such an extraordinarily successful careeer as a business journalist and author. But the lessons she learned in her earliest days - how to write so a five-year-old child could understand, how to write to word count, the sanctity of deadlines, and perhaps most importantly how to ask questions without embarrassment - have stood her in good stead.  That kind of unashamed questioning is a trait also shared by many of the leaders she interviewed for her latest book 'The Disruptors', shortlisted for the Business Book Awards. In this conversation she shares her hard-won lessons for writers, and also reflects on how business and business writing has changed over recent years and where the opportunities for those writing in the space can be found. 

People who write business books - at least, business books worth reading - tend to think a little differently. This ‘Best Bits’ episode features a formidable line-up of disruptors, each of whom brings a very personal toolkit for unsettling the status quo, in work and in life. Challenging the system often starts by asking awkward questions and you'll find lots of those here. What you WON'T find are excuses. Think you’re not creative or confident enough to be an author? This is for you.  Listen, enjoy, but don’t expect to leave with your assumptions undisturbed. Hear from:  Charlotte Otter on why we need new leaders (and how to get them);  Hilary Cottam on reimagining work; Lesie Grandy on creative velocity; Mike Porteous on redefining confidence;  Todd Sattersten on books - and publishing models - that turn things upside down;  Jane Friedman on why you should consider NOT writing a book;  Georgia Kirke on how AI can help unleash the missing voices;  Kerry Tottingham on how to launch a book differently.  Let's keep shaking things up, brilliantly.

'I see confidence as something that's rooted in how we feel before any words, something which touches on sensations.' What do you think of when you think of sports coaching? Elite lean performance machines preparing to break records?  Mike Porteous has competed and coached at elite level as a triathlete, but he believes that coaxing new swimmers from the shallow end is just as important an act of coaching as taking an elite to a new world Ironman time.  His vision of coaching is centred on confidence - and all the messy, emotional reality that surrounds human ambition, at whatever scale. To allow people to go beyond what they believed themselves capable of - in sport and in life - the coach needs to build confidence in three directions: the athlete's confidence in their own ability, the athlete's confidence in the coach, and, crucially, the coach's confidence in themselves. There's an obvious parallel to the book-writing process, and the slow-burn confidence demanded of authors to grapple the uncertainty and believe that their message is worthwhile. If you're involved in coaching, in whatever capacity, and particularly if you're writing about it, this is for you. 

 "How do you want your book to make people feel? Start with the feeling and then work your way backwards." When you're all about creativity, social justice and empowering individuals to transform pain into positive action, how do you design a book launch that reflects that?  Kerry Tottingham rejected the warm white wine option for a radically different book launch event to celebrate the launch of her new book 'Healing-Centred Transformation: Mend, tend and change the future'. This week's podcast is a behind-the-scenes look at how she did it, with insights and advice for anyone planning a book launch of their own. 

What does a good working life look like in the 21st century? Dr Hilary Cottam, OBE has spent the last five years exploring this question through collaborative workshops she calls 'imagininings', involving all sectors of the post-industrial workforce from gravediggers to consultants. The same resonant themes kept emerging: the need for work that pays the basics, offers meaning, allows space for caring and play, is tied to place, and demands collective, not just individual, change. She discovered that the challenges we face - technological disruption, ecological crisis and a lack of social justice - together provide the springboard for this change. And in the process of putting it all together into her new book, The Work We Need, she also discovered that writing, like change-making, is a slow, humbling process best done in community.  Profound, challenging, generous, inspiring - and very much worth your listen.