'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.