The SYP’s final speaker meeting of 2009 focused on a skill that many young publishers would hope to cultivate – commissioning books that become bestsellers. But can an editor learn to spot trends and commission sure-fire money-makers?   Our speakers for the evening were Antonia Hodgson, Editor-in-Chief of the commercial division at Little, Brown Book Group, Jon Wood, Deputy Publisher at Orion Books, and Suzanne Baboneau, Pub...

Over the last six months, whenever I’ve heard publishers discuss Dan Brown, it’s usually been in quite a negative tone.  This is something that I’ve found quite surprising, since he is one of the bestselling authors of all time.  Indeed, he’s the bestselling author of adult fiction (no, not the dirty kind, although Robert Langdon and Vittoria Vetra did get up to some tantric sex in Angels and Demons).  ...

The penultimate London speaker meeting of the SYP’s 60th year took place in Foyle’s gallery. The event was a showcase of some of the best of today’s award winning authors across fiction, non-fiction and children’s publishing.   RJ Ellory was the first to take to the floor.  He is the author of seven published novels, including A Quiet Belief in Angels which was a Richard & Judy Book Club selection in ...

Given what the weather conditions were like on the weekend of the SYP conference, it was a sure-fire bet a lot of young (and not-so-young) publishers would be blowing about at this year’s conference at Oxford Brookes University. 'Making an ImPRESSion' was this year’s theme and impressions were clearly made on the 200 who came together for the event. When you gather together like-minded people you’re bound to agree on most...

I have spent a long while thinking about it. That night. It’s been repeated once since then. I’d get into the office an...

So what shape do you think that a broken heart takes? In what sense can that phrase be construed? I’m serving breakfast in bed to Doro...

The recent SYP Annual Conference tackled some major questions as it examined "the impact of publishing on society". Jon Slack and Alan Cromp...

What does a typical day as a designer involve? A work day tends to be pretty varied but always really busy. I have a staff of four designers and we...