London Writers' Salon

Pellerin Books founders Laura Palmer and Jessie Sullivan on how readers discover books now, where to put your marketing money, and why the quality of the book still decides everything.
You'll learn
The rule that quietly decides which authors get a publisher’s time, budget and attention.
Why the first question about marketing a book is never “how?”
How to research your readers and your market without paying for a single tool.
The metric that makes an ad campaign look like it is working when nothing is.
What a cover and a developmental edit should cost, and the one place never to skimp.
Why raising your ad budget too fast makes it perform worse, not better.
How subscription reading changed what a sagging middle chapter costs a writer.
Whether a publisher actually cares how many followers you have.
Three books on writing that between them cover almost everything, and the two-word rule that keeps readers turning pages.
Why you cannot keyword your way into a reader’s life in the age of AI search.
Resources & Links
📄 Interview Transcript
Pellerin Books
K-Lytics
Publisher Rocket
Kindlepreneur
Pellerin Submissions
Bookbub
Save the Cat! Writes a Novel: The Last Book On Novel Writing You’ll Ever Need by Jessica Brody
On Writing by Stephen King
A Swim in the Pond in the Rain by George Saunders
Pellerin Publishing Advice
About Pellerin Books
Pellerin Books is a new independent publisher of popular fiction, built for the way readers discover and fall in love with books today. It publishes immersive, emotionally engaging stories readers can’t put down – from thrillers to romance, historical fiction to science fiction, saga to fantasy and everything in between. It is a digital-focus publisher, which means ebooks and audiobooks are at the heart of what it does, although all its titles are available in paperback for readers who love to hold a book in their hands.
At Pellerin, we believe deeply in good books and the difference they can make. We became publishers because we believe in the craft of storytelling, the power to create living worlds and characters that reach beyond the page. Making books, for us, is a way to be part of that strange magic that binds reader and author when the right book gets into the right hands.
About Laura Palmer & Jessie Sullivan
Laura’s love of storytelling drew her into the publishing industry in 2007 as an assistant at Quercus Books, where she was part of the team that discovered and published Stieg Larsson. In 2010, she joined Corvus, where she rode the ebook boom, delivering sales previously unheard of for new authors, and was shortlisted for the Kim Scott Walwyn prize for women in publishing. In 2012, she co-founded Head of Zeus, alongside publishing veterans Anthony and Nicolas Cheetham. As executive director and fiction publisher, Laura ran three imprints and published more than a hundred authors at Head of Zeus. Bestselling authors she has worked with include Dani Atkins, JP Delaney, Dan Jones, Graham Masterton and Amanda Prowse.
Jessie Sullivan has spent her career at the intersection of publishing and performance-led marketing. She is one of the most commercially effective marketers in modern publishing, with over £8 million in directly attributed revenue and more than £10 million in total marketing impact.

For show notes, transcripts and to attend our live podcasts visit: podcast.londonwriterssalon.com.
For free writing sessions, join free Writers’ Hours: writershour.com.
*
FOLLOW LONDON WRITERS’ SALON
Twitter: twitter.com/​​WritersSalon
Instagram: instagram.com/londonwriterssalon
Facebook: facebook.com/LondonWritersSalon
If you’re enjoying this show, please rate and review this show!

Award-winning novelist Lily King on finding the emotional arc of a novel, writing the scene you keep avoiding, and making peace with ambition, self-criticism and the long road to a first book.
You'll learn
Why the scene you most want to avoid is usually the one your book needs.
How a small change in the final pages of one section can rebuild an entire novel.
What it means to think in emotional arc rather than theme.
The difference between being hard on yourself about writing and being hard on yourself while you write.
Why giving yourself permission to write about your own life can unlock everything that follows.
When a middle section goes flat, and how to find the engine it's missing.
How ambition shows up differently for women writers, and the shame that can come with it.
A notebook method built on margins, timelines, and a daily writing log.
Why a bad review can be more useful than praise.
What nine years on a first novel teaches you about patience.
Resources & Links
📄 Interview Transcript
It's Not The End of the World by Judy Blume
The Pleasing Hour by Lily King
The English Teacher by Lily King
Euphoria by Lily King
Tom Lake by Ann Patchett
Heart the Lover by Lily King
Plot and Structure by James Scott Bell
@lilykingbooks - Lily's Instagram
The Correspondent by Virginia Evans
About Lily King
Lily King is the award-winning author of six novels. Her most recent novel, Heart the Lover, was published on September 30th, 2025. She has also published a collection of short stories, Five Tuesdays in Winter. Her 2020 novel, Writers & Lovers, won the New England Society Book Awards and was a New York Times Notable Book and chosen as a top-ten best book of 2020 by The Washington Post, NPR, People Magazine, and The Los Angeles Times. Her 2014 novel Euphoria won the Kirkus Prize, the New England Book Award, and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Euphoria was named one of the 10 Best Books of 2014 by The New York Times Book Review. It was included in TIME's Top 10 Fiction Books of 2014, as well as on Amazon, NPR, Entertainment Weekly, Publishers Weekly, and Salon's Best Books of 2014.

For show notes, transcripts and to attend our live podcasts visit: podcast.londonwriterssalon.com.
For free writing sessions, join free Writers’ Hours: writershour.com.
*
FOLLOW LONDON WRITERS’ SALON
Twitter: twitter.com/​​WritersSalon
Instagram: instagram.com/londonwriterssalon
Facebook: facebook.com/LondonWritersSalon
If you’re enjoying this show, please rate and review this show!

CAA literary agent Rachel Mann on what makes her say yes to a manuscript, how to navigate the submissions process without losing control of your career, and why cutting is the work that makes prose land.

You'll learn

Why the recognition an agent needs is physical rather than analytical.

What to do when you're not sure your manuscript is ready to send out.

How to buy more time after a full manuscript request without killing the momentum.

Why telling other agents about your requests works in your favour, even if it feels grubby.

The realistic rhythm for chasing an agent who has gone quiet.

Whether refusing to use social media can cost a writer representation.

A question worth answering before you sign with anyone, and why the answer shapes the edit.

The edit most manuscripts need before submission, and why it rarely means adding.

How poetry's distillation applies to prose, whatever you write.

What still gives an agent hope in a market where people are reading less.

Resources & Links

Rachel's Website

Marianne Dreams by Catherine Storr

Waterstones

Puffin

Jo Unwin Literary Agency

Karolina Sutton agent

Harriet Poland agent

Sarah Harvey agent

John Ash agent

Boy Parts by Eliza Clark

Ottessa Moshfegh author

Society of Authors

The Arvon Foundation

To Query CAA: Email ukbooksubmissions@caa.com. To submit, please send a cover email, one-page synopsis and the first three chapters of your work, or the rough equivalent.

About Rachel Mann

Rachel Mann is a Literary Agent at CAA and represents a broad range of work – largely fiction, with some non-fiction — from commercial to literary, in adult, young adult, and middle-grade markets.

Her clients include Eliza Clark, Caleb Femi, Jade LB and Aisling Rawle, and have won and been listed for major prizes, including the Granta Best Young British Novelist, the Forward Prize for Poetry, the Rathbones Folio Prize, the Jhalak Prize, the Waterstone’s Children’s Book Prize, the YA Book Prize, The Bookseller Discover Prize, and the Carnegie Medal.

She spent ten years editing and commissioning fiction for young people at houses including Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster, and was global publishing director at the Roald Dahl Story Company. She became an agent in 2018 and joined CAA in 2023.

For show notes, transcripts and to attend our live podcasts visit: podcast.londonwriterssalon.com.
For free writing sessions, join free Writers’ Hours: writershour.com.
*
FOLLOW LONDON WRITERS’ SALON
Twitter: twitter.com/​​WritersSalon
Instagram: instagram.com/londonwriterssalon
Facebook: facebook.com/LondonWritersSalon
If you’re enjoying this show, please rate and review this show!

In this special episode we go behind the scenes with memoirist Deepa Paul, essayist, cookbook author Gina Beach, and novelist Daisy Buchanan and talk about the two things that keep them going: the passion behind the work, and the practice that makes the work possible.

From an essay that no editor wanted to a Women's Prize-longlisted memoir, a personal research rabbit hole that became a four-year book project, and the journey from idea to novel, this is a personal conversation with three writers about about why they write the things they write — and what kept them going.

You'll learn

Why an essay no editor wanted a decade ago turned out not to be an essay at all.

How to break a book into tasks small enough to finish inside a single hour.

The case for treating your own interior life as seriously as any grand subject.

How a rabbit hole of personal research turned into a four-year book project.

Why the hardest part of self-publishing has nothing to do with production.

When procrastination is doing useful work, and when it's just filling the gaps.

What changes in your writing once you stop trying to get it right.

A reason to stop measuring a writing session by its word count.

How sitting alongside other writers quietly rearranges your sense of your own work.

The tidal metaphor that makes a bad writing day easier to let go of.

Resources & Links

Writers' Hour

Ask Me: A Memoir of Daring to Love Differently by Deepa Paul

Deepa Paul

'The power of an hour' — Deepa Paul interviewed by the Women's Prize

Nurture: Oil-Free, Plant-Based Cooking for Health by Regina Beach

Regina Beach

All Grown Up: A hilarious and heartwarming new novel inspired by Little Women by Daisy Buchanan

Daisy Buchanan — Creative Confidence Clinic

About the Guests

Deepa Paul is a Filipina-Indian author living in Amsterdam. Her writing explores the balance between being a mother, wife, girlfriend, daughter, adventurer, and herself – all at the same time. Her debut, Ask Me: A Memoir of Daring to Love Differently, was longlisted for the Women's Prize.

Regina Beach is a disabled poet and essayist. Originally from the American midwest, she now calls the Welsh Valleys home. Her writing has appeared in Global Poemic, Boldly Mental, The Rail, Haiku by You, Five Minutes, Visual Verse, The Horror Tree, and Disoriented among others. She is the founder of the literary magazine Lesions | Art + Words, which features the work of people living with chronic health conditions. Her book is Nurture: Oil-Free, Plant-Based Cooking for Health.

Daisy Buchanan is an award-winning journalist, broadcaster and author of Insatiable (longlisted for the CWIP prize), Careering (as heard on BBC Sounds), Limelight and Pity Party, and the non-fiction titles How to Be A Grown Up, The Sisterhood and Read Yourself Happy. She writes for major newspapers and magazines from the Guardian to Grazia, and is host of the chart-topping podcast You're Booked. Her latest book is All Grown Up: A hilarious and heartwarming new novel inspired by Little Women.

For show notes, transcripts and to attend our live podcasts visit: podcast.londonwriterssalon.com.
For free writing sessions, join free Writers’ Hours: writershour.com.
*
FOLLOW LONDON WRITERS’ SALON
Twitter: twitter.com/​​WritersSalon
Instagram: instagram.com/londonwriterssalon
Facebook: facebook.com/LondonWritersSalon
If you’re enjoying this show, please rate and review this show!

Children’s fiction studio founder Jasmine Richards (Storymix), publisher Natalie Doherty (Puffin and HarperCollins Children’s Books), and bestselling author Soman Chainani (The School for Good and Evil) on shaping an idea commercial enough to sell, what makes a children’s book impossible to put down, and trusting the unconscious to write it.

 

You’ll learn

Why the most commercial idea is the one that centres its reader from the very first thought.

How a single pithy log line can carry a book all the way from the slush pile to the playground.

The counterintuitive trick of starting your story at chapter three.

How to read what children are reading now so your pacing keeps up with theirs.

What a publisher is really looking for when a manuscript lands on the desk — and why voice comes before plot.

How the categories from early readers to YA actually break down on the bookshop shelf.

The difference between weaving in a message and writing a book that feels worthy.

The case for never self-censoring in a first draft, and saving the negotiation for later.

How tiring out your conscious mind can unlock a freer, more instinctive way to draft.

Why the goal of writing should be the writing itself, not the bestseller list.

 

Episode Links

#050: Jasmine Richards — How to Pitch Commercial Children’s Fiction & The Business of Children’s Publishing

#081: Natalie Doherty — The Magic of Writing for Children, Market Trends & Behind the Scenes of Publishing Children’s Books

#035: Soman Chainani — Writing Dark Tales for Children & Balancing Creative Work with Discipline

 

About the Guests

Jasmine Richards is the author of over a dozen children’s books, ranging from picture books to teen fiction. Her most recent novel, Keeper of Myths, was published by HarperCollins. She has over 15 years of experience as an editor, including roles at Hamish Hamilton, Puffin, and Dutton Books in New York. Jasmine is the founder of Storymix, a children’s fiction studio, where she uses her unique experiences to develop new voices and inclusive stories.

Natalie Doherty is a Publisher at Puffin, although during this interview she was at HarperCollins Children’s Books. She’s worked with award-winning and bestselling authors, including Tom Fletcher, Robin Stevens, R. J. Palacio, Tamzin Merchant, and Nazneen Ahmed Pathak. Before moving into editorial in 2010, she worked in Contracts and Rights at Hachette and holds a BA in Modern European Languages and an MA in Translation. Her recent middle-grade acquisitions include Simon Stephenson’s The Snowman Code and Philippa Leathley’s Inkbound.

Soman Chainani’s debut series, The School for Good and Evil, has sold more than 3 million copies, been translated into 30 languages across 6 continents, and became a major motion picture from Netflix starring Charlize Theron, Laurence Fishburne, Kerry Washington, and Michelle Yeoh, with Chainani as an executive producer. Each of the six books in the series — The School for Good and Evil, A World Without Princes, The Last Ever After, Quests for Glory, A Crystal of Time, and One True King — debuted on the New York Times Bestseller list. A graduate of Harvard University, Soman created his own fairy-tale major before going on to an MFA in film at Columbia University. He has made films that have played all over the world, and his writing awards include honors from Big Bear Lake, the CAPE Foundation, and the Sun Valley Writers’ Fellowship. In Beasts & Beauty: Dangerous Tales, Soman reimagines old stories into fresh fairy tales for a new era.

For show notes, transcripts and to attend our live podcasts visit: podcast.londonwriterssalon.com.
For free writing sessions, join free Writers’ Hours: writershour.com.
*
FOLLOW LONDON WRITERS’ SALON
Twitter: twitter.com/​​WritersSalon
Instagram: instagram.com/londonwriterssalon
Facebook: facebook.com/LondonWritersSalon
If you’re enjoying this show, please rate and review this show!