Getting on the UK’s Holy Grail: the Richard & Judy Show

Amanda Ross may well be the most powerful woman in UK publishing right now, but as the Times’ Erica Wagner finds out, this is one woman who bristles at the notion. “I really, really don’t – and I don’t pretend that I know what definitely will make a bestseller. That’s not how I choose the books. My criteria, honestly, is: is this book going to entertain and engage people enough to generate 12 to 15 minutes of gripping television? The bottom line is: what’s the sofa chat?”

The “sofa chat” (which Ross defines as “having good takeaway” aka whether the reader will get something lasting from the book) has, in over three years of the Book Club’s existence, propelled many a book to the top of the bestseller charts. And no doubt the next crop of summer reads – ranging from Elizabeth Kostova’s THE HISTORIAN to Jim Lynch’s THE HIGHEST TIDE to Elisabeth Hyde’s THE ABORTIONIST’S DAUGHTER – will do the same thanks to Ross’s handpicking…

The most amusing part of the interview happens at the end, when Wagner asks Ross if she’s read anything by Meg Wolitzer as Wagner “so loved THE WIFE and THE POSITION.” Turns out Ross hasn’t heard of the books and duly writes their names down. “Just for a moment, I think: golly. What have I done?” Probably not that much, Erica, but you never know, do you…

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