Guest Speaker - Geoffrey Gudgion

Geoffrey Gudgion gave us a fascinating talk which gave us insights into the world of publishing and self-publishing, as well as his own writing journey. 

After moving from a career in the Royal Navy, business and consultancy, Geoffrey had decided to devote himself to writing full time. He described his attempts to find an agent and how lucky he was to find someone who was both loyal and supportive.

Geoffrey described how the publishing business was now almost totally dominated by Amazon, though books are themselves only a relatively small part of their business. The influence of Amazon has meant that they effectively structure the market. If your books aren’t deemed to ‘fit’ their business model, which divides the market by genres, and Geoffrey’s didn’t, however good your work you can find yourself sidelined. Geoffrey had learned that he needed to find a way to sell his ‘cross-over’ novels (part historical fiction, part sci-fi, part supernatural) and this had led him, via his agent, to work with different publishers having alternative business models, such as the digital house Bookouture.

He told us that around 450k books were published per year, of which 420k were self-published, most of the latter, in his view, of dubious quality.

The evening ended with Geoffrey describing his writing day (no internet, no ‘phone) and then reading an extract from his latest novel, Hammer of Fate, the first of what will be at least a trilogy, featuring, in his own words ‘a kick-ass, cross-dressing medieval nun’.