It was what my mother used to call a dog day – one of those steamy, cloudy, still days of August when nothing much changes. I was walking to the copse at the end of Clapham Common and, when I entered it, could see it hadn’t altered much since I was last there. Two men with bicycles were waiting patiently for their lovers, one beside a bench and the other near a battered sign. Further on was a blunt looking Scotty dog, busy and alert amongst the undergrowth. There was nothing else remarkable except for the stillness of the foliage, all noise of the surrounding roads dimmed by the moist atmosphere and lack of breeze. I stood quite still, concentrated and enchanted, flashing back down the years to my childhood.

Occasionally, during a quiet school holiday, my mother would say, ‘Let’s go out in the car…’ She and I would set off, full of expectation and enthusiasm, and after meandering around for a while, often seemed to end up down a deep track in a wood. There, she’d turn off the engine, we’d wind down the windows, and go very quiet, smelling the bracken, listening to the invisible birds high up in the trees, watching the sunlight change amongst the undergrowth. It was always a magical moment, filled with joy. Eventually, she’d sigh and say, ‘Isn’t it wonderful? It’s so primitive…’

What she meant, I think, was the way you can sometimes feel fully alive when you go quiet and really focus on where you are - often helped by being completely still, in a place of natural beauty.

This is all in my mind at the moment because of the recent visit to London by Zen master, Thich Nhat Hanh. He gave a speech at the Hammersmith Apollo a couple of weeks ago, and some of us went to hear him from the office. He was as inspiring and as extraordinary as ever, demonstrating what real concentration is all about in the way he picked up a glass of water to drink, in the way he spoke for an hour without notes (though he is in his eighties), and in the clarity of mind he used in answering the questions, his face alight. But what I haven’t been able to forget was the way, when he finished speaking, he just left. Whilst others around him on the stage began to move and reorganise for the next part of the evening, Thich Nhat Hanh simply stood up, turned to face the backdrop, and slipped away. There was no bow to the audience, no pause for applause. Nothing. The contrast between him and all the rock bands, mediums, orators and dancers who have filled Hammersmith Apollo before him, was enormous.

That evening I started re-reading his seminal book, The Miracle of Mindfulness. I hadn’t forgotten how practical and helpful is his advice about performing everyday tasks with mindfulness. He makes it all seem so simple. Perhaps it really is. But I had forgotten how very profound are his instructions ‘so we can live each minute of life’. At some point he says: ‘If we’re really engaged in mindfulness…then we will consider each step we take as an infinite wonder, and a joy will open our hearts like a flower, enabling us to enter the world of reality.’

Perhaps that’s what my mother and I were really doing, deep inside that wood, without realising it – getting a dose of reality by fully focusing on where we were. And what I caught a glimpse of once again on Clapham Common last Saturday.

Judith Kendra - Rider Publishing Director

Read an extract of The Miracle of Mindfulness

As we near publication of Delia’s Happy Christmas and I have time to reflect over the last few months, I thought it might be interesting to tell you what we have been up to. Like Christmas, the production of a book is all about the planning. First we need 150 recipes. Then we commission a photographer. Finally add a designer.

Of course it’s not that simple, but this is where we start – putting the team together. Delia knew exactly who she wanted to work with so my first step was to contact everybody and ensure they were all available during the key dates – photography, layout stage and proof checking. We cleared two weeks in everybody’s schedule for the photography (no easy task as the team was based across three different continents) and this gave me a firm date to work to – so that I could work out the production schedule. It’s best to work backwards from the publication date, but when I did this, I realised that we should have begun work a month ago. Oh well, production will just have to print the book quicker! One other question arose – props for the shoot. Our shoot was just after Christmas so the props stylist had to hunt high and low for these unseasonal items. He did a great job and we recreated Christmas in May for the book.

Christmas means turkey

The next key stage is the heart of the book – the recipes. We used a number of recipes from Delia’s original Christmas book – classics such as Roast Turkey, Traditional Christmas Pudding and Christmas Cake. Delia also wrote many new recipes – Chestnut Cupcakes, for example. These little cakes have become so popular that it seemed entirely appropriate to have a festive version. The Last-Minute Christmas chapter was also a very modern addition, and how useful it will be. We also needed to ensure that all the older recipes were updated where necessary – for example, with the advent of vac-packed or frozen chestnuts, we no longer need to laboriously cook and peel them. A little less butter here and there, a few recipes re-tested and all the suppliers contacted to ensure that we have all the correct contact addresses and delivery dates.

The last few weeks

As we approach the publication date, it’s time to negotiate the huge internal and external interest in this book. Our sales, marketing and publicity departments needed jacket proofs, recipe lists, sample pages. Then, we finalise the jacket finishes and bindings with the designer and our production department. We mock up a bookshelf, inserting our book jacket into a photograph of a shop display of best-selling hardbacks to see how ours compares. Stunning – its simple elegance really makes it stand out against the usual autumn list of celebrity biographies and chef cookbooks. We’re all really excited.

Muna - Editorial Director

This post was originally displayed on Delia Online - visit the site to find out how you can buy the book for 50% off!

If you look to the heavens this Saturday (4 September) you will see the Harvest Moon – a sure sign that Autumn is just around the corner. In Jane Struthers’ fascinating volume of countryside wisdom, Red Sky at Night, she explains:

“The harvest moon is the full moon that appears closest to the autumn equinox (20 or 21 September), and the hunter’s moon is the full moon that appears in the following month (October). Both are special because they rise on successive evenings more quickly than the other moons of the year. This means there is a shorter period of darkness between sunset and moonrise, so there is more light outside for farmers and hunters to do their work.

“They look larger than other moons because they hang lower in the sky, thanks to the Earth’s tilt at this time of year, and they can look redder because the light of the moon is seen through the vast number of particles that are in the atmosphere closest to the Earth.”

And did you know that January’s moon is called the Wolf Moon, and June’s either the Mead or Strawberry Moon? This beautiful book is overflowing with facts like these that were once common knowledge. Dip into the spreads below and remind yourself of life before the internet and blogs (or even electricity).

Charlotte – Senior Commissioning Editor

The Oxford University Dictionary defines ‘bonkbuster’ as: ‘a type of popular novel characterised by frequent sexual encounters between the characters’.

It’s a rather dull definition for what for me is the most gloriously fun of fiction genres. Bonkbusters are the purest (!) forms of commercial fiction: sexy, glamorous and utterly escapist. This is fiction whose sole purpose is to entertain the reader.

The perfect bonkbuster should be sexy and have a glitzy, cosmopolitan background. It should feature strong, powerful heroines, bad-boy alpha-male heroes and villains, at least one super bitch and, yes, lots of bonking!

I’ve been a fan of the genre since I first ‘borrowed’ my father’s second-hand copy of Harold Robbins at an age when I really should have been reading about little houses on prairies. And it’s no wonder that in a world full of doom and gloom, bonkbusters are once again undergoing a revival, with newer writers like Tasmina Perry topping the bestseller lists and older writers like Jackie Collins as popular as ever.

When I first started buying fiction here at Ebury, top of my wish list was to find a new bonkbusting talent. And I’m delighted that we have not one, but two authors carrying on the great bonkbusting tradition of glitz and glam, sex and shopping in 2009.

Out this month we have Tease by the divine Ms Immodesty Blaize. Immodesty is putting the bonk back into bonkbuster with her sparkling debut set in the uber-glam world of showgirls. This is Jackie Collins does burlesque and is a funny, camp, saucy delight of a book.

Coming in August is Silk by Rupert James, a fantastic bonkbuster meets blockbuster novel, set in the world of high fashion and high profile divorces. Silk is the ultimate glitz and glamour novel, a fantastic holiday read…Rupert is bringing a fresh 21st century spin to this classic genre.

But, for the benefits of those who’ve looked at me blankly when I’ve tried to explain that Silk is Lace for the 21st century, here’s a whistle stop tour through the best of the classic bonkbusters. (And for those who already know their Scruples from their Rivals, do let me know if I’ve missed any of your favourites…)

The Valley of the Dolls – Jacqueline Susann
It’s still the darkest of all the bonkbusters - and some would argue it’s not a bonkbuster at all. (It was most recently published by feminist imprint Virago in the UK.) It’s set in the dark underbelly of showbiz, following the adventures – romantic, professional and pharmaceutical – of three women as they try to achieve fame and fortune. A cult classic.

Scruples - Judith Krantz
The ultimate sex and shopping novel. It’s even set in an up market department store where the mega-rich shop, gossip and have liaisons…. There’s a sequel – the unimaginatively titled… Scruples Two. But look out instead for Krantz’s rather fabulous Princess Daisy, a royal bonkbuster!

Lace - Shirley Conran
Ask most women over thirty to name a bonkbuster and this is the one they’ll mention – swiftly followed by memories of one specific ‘goldfish’ scene. This is also one of the first ‘dirty’ books I remember being passed around at school. It’s the story of one girl’s search for the mother who gave her away as a baby. It also spawned a gloriously trashy 80s mini-series (‘Which one of you bitches is my mother?’) Lace 2 is the search for Daddy.

Riders; Polo; Rivals; The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous - Jilly Cooper
Jilly Cooper is the queen of the British bonkbuster but still best loved for her series of home counties-set books, featuring polo playing cad Rupert Campbell Black. Women of all ages fell for Rupert - the sexiest bad-boy hero in bonkbusting history. (And partly inspired, according to Jilly, by Brigadier Andrew Parker Bowles, ex-husband of Camilla! But don’t let that put you off…)

Jackie Collins
For many, Jackie remains the reigning queen of bonkbusters. Her list of titles is seemingly endless and she’s still going strong. Some of the oldest are still the best, however, start with Hollywood Wives, Chances or Lucky.

The Carpet Baggers - Harold Robbins
Robbins is the god-father of blockbuster/bonkbuster fiction and The Carpet Baggers is the best of the bunch. According to the New York Times: ‘It is not quite proper to have printed The Carpet Baggers between the covers of a book. It should have been inscribed on the walls of a public lavatory.’ What more do you need to know?

Olivia Goldsmith
Her later books were far more chick lit than bonkbuster but do check out The First Wives’ Club, which is a wonderful bonkbuster revenge fantasy. (And has an iconic and cheeky ‘testicles as golfball’ cover. Also, Bestseller which is one of the few novels set in publishing that actually rather good, albeit in a gloriously silly way!

The Thorn Birds - Colleen McCullough
Australia’s wonderfully epic contribution to the bonkbuster genre. A young girl falls in love with a priest.

Master of the Game - Sidney Sheldon
Highly prolific author (over 300 million books in print) but Master of the Game is a good place to start. A big sprawling blockbuster novel that spans four generations of one family, from diamond stealing in South Africa to the rise and fall of a multi-national business. Sheldon sadly died in 2007 but in 2009, Tilly Bagshawe will take on his mantle with a sequel Mistress of the Game.

Ebury opened its arms to the huggable Justin Lee Collins yesterday. He took time out from learning to ballroom dance, high dive and Mexican wrestle for TV to come and chat about his hilarious coming-of-age memoir Good Times! which we publish this Autumn. Our deeply serious and highly professional brainstorm included such weighty discussion points as hugging and ‘how about a karaoke night!’

Justin then regaled us with stories of how be got to where he is now. By accident. How he went from the M&S years where he was told to ‘walk faster’ by his boss. Bad times. To street jamming in spandex and wrestling in lycra and manhandling Alan Carr on national TV on a weekly basis. Rock on!

Justin then met the whole Ebury team over drinks where there was a bit of singing, a few spontaneous hugs, and chats all round before Justin had to head off to ITV for the press launch of his new chat show The Justin Lee Collins Show.

As he left the building our flustered MD was overheard saying ‘I’d only just come into the room when, before I knew it, I was being given a big beardy kiss!’

Rowan - Editor

This spring sees the return of Doctor Who to our screens in the first of four specials.

Companions and Allies is a lavish new guide to the show, containing information about the friends and heroic comrades who have accompanied the most famous of Time Lords over the years. From William Hartnell’s first Doctor to David Tennant’s highly lauded regeneration, this book shows how human beings have been plucked from their often ordinary lives into a world of adventure, and how Earth forces such as UNIT, with Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and others, have joined the Doctor in the battle against the Galaxy’s greatest evils.

Author Steve Tribe has selected his favourite spreads from the book to give you a sneak preview inside.  Click on any of the images to zoom in.

Nick - BBC Books Editorial Assistant

It’s a hard-knock life being an editor – what with all the long lunches to be had and magnums of champagne to be quaffed – and so holidays take on added significance. Creative juices need to be re-stocked and livers allowed time off to recover. Which is why I jetted off to Tanzania on safari. As you can see from the PowerPoint presentation of holiday snaps I’m sure the marketing department have taken care to upload, I had a wonderful time. It’s a shame the elephant needed three shots of the blunderbuss to finish it off, but there you go. My freshly carved ivory cane is more than adequate recompense for having to endure Dumbo’s trumpeted death knell. I shall give it a twirl now…

More importantly, going on holiday allowed me a chance to read. Books. For fun. That’s the problem with being an editor – spending most of your working day leafing through manuscripts with pen held aloft, ready to swoop like a vulture on a butchered gazelle, isn’t exactly conducive to reading for pleasure come the evening. Therefore, holidays allow a welcome opportunity to leave the Red Pen of Doom at home (securely locked in an air-tight safe, along with the cat) and select some books that offer nothing other than the simple delights of, well, reading them.

So, how did I compile my holiday reading list? First off, I work on non-fiction, so that was Stalingrad out the window. Literally. It landed on a passing tramp who actually seemed quite grateful for the reading matter once he’d regained consciousness. For my part, I was going to read fiction, and fiction alone. My final selection, stuffed into an already bulging rucksack, were:

Empire of the Sun by JG Ballard – a book I’ve wanted to read to read for ages, and was even willing to pay for out of my very own pocket (1p + p&p from Amazon marketplace).

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe – I always like to read something by a local writer when I go abroad. Well, okay, Achebe’s actually from Nigeria, but what’s a few thousand miles? It’s the same continent, alright? Also, the book is only 150 pages, which was a bonus.

A Good Man in Africa by William Boyd – A jaunty satire about a Brit working in the diplomatic service in an unidentified West African country. Coincidentally, I have a friend in the Foreign Office who’s just moved to work in Nigeria, so I couldn’t help but imagine him as the main character. Which is unfortunate, as he contracts gonorrhoea from sleeping with a local prostitute.

The Ghost by Robert Harris – An easy-to-read thriller to see me through the long night slumped in a corner of Doha airport in Qatar, trying fruitlessly to ignore the baleful wailing of children and incomprehensible Tannoy announcements, as I awaited my connecting flight back home.

And lastly, Ulysses by James Joyce…

My final choice perhaps needs further explanation. Why, you might legitimately ask, did I choose to take Ulysses as a holiday read? Am I insane?! No, despite what the Crown Prosecution Service might say, I am not. It’s simply that, given most of my domestic reading takes place on the tube, amid sweaty armpits, jabbing elbows and temperatures that would be illegal even in a third world sweatshop, it’s hard to summon up the necessary levels of concentration to read anything more complicated than The Hungry Caterpillar. Relaxed on holiday, I thought I’d finally have the time and tranquil environment to finish a book I’ve long wanted to boast to friends I’ve actually read.

In the event, I managed to get through four out of the five books listed above. If you think you can guess which one I didn’t read, send me your answer on a postcard c/o Ebury Press and you could be the lucky winner of a half-eaten packet of stale Hob Nobs I have sitting on my desk.

Anyway, next year I’m going to Mexico and taking War and Peace with me…

Ken - Editor

The oceans are the single most important feature of our planet - they shape the climate, our culture and our future. Yet we know more about the surface of Mars than we do about Earth’s watery depths. The new BBC series and the accompanying book draws on the most exciting stories from the fields of sub-aquatic archaeology, geology, marine biology and anthropology.

To whet your appetite, we asked Paul Rose, who is a presenter on the series and one of the book’s authors, to share some of Oceans’ amazing facts with us. Over 1,000 dives, the filming produced a number of ‘firsts’ – not least the discovery of a whole new species! It’s going to be an amazing series, and a fantastic book – here are Paul’s highlights…

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It started with a simple idea: Ben Cook approached Russell T Davies and asked if he’d like to write about his creative process: how he plans a series of Doctor Who, how he writes the scripts, how key decisions are made, how he works on a daily basis to create the show that millions of us watch on Saturday evenings. Russell was keen, and soon they were sending each other several emails a day, Ben asking questions and Russell fleshing out ideas for characters and plots and sharing scripts in various drafts. A year later, they had exchanged hundreds of emails and amassed hundreds of thousands of words documenting the story of Series 4 (the one with Catherine Tate) and sharing ideas and opinions on what makes great writing, great drama, and great television. It makes for addictive reading.

It’s also choc-a-bloc with photos from the set, many of them supplied by the cast and crew themselves, and Russell – who, before he turned to writing was a cartoonist – drew over three dozen original illustrations exclusively for the book. Put all of these wonderful bits together, and you have the ultimate gift book for the dedicated Doctor Who fan. (And I should stress the ‘dedicated’ part: this is not really an impulse buy for your young teen. We also have one of those coming out this Christmas, though, don’t worry).

The subtitle of The Writer’s Tale is ‘The Untold Story of the BBC Series’, which may sound boastful, but also happens to be true – as it turns out, despite the millions of words written about Doctor Who since the show returned in 2005, there are still many new, exciting, scary, hilarious and outright bizarre stories to be told. Especially if Russell T Davies is the one doing the telling.

Albert - Editorial Director

Read an extract of The Writer’s Tale on the Times website.

I am often asked what my favourite part of the publishing process is. Is it finalizing a deal? Seeing a cover design for the first time? Holding the finished book in my hand? Or am I in it just for the fabulous pay?

I enjoy all of these aspects of my job – especially the fabulous pay – but nothing comes close to the feeling I get when editing a manuscript. I always feel privileged to be the first pair of eyes to see an author’s work and the dialogue I enter with an author about structure, substance and tone is a process I hold dear.

It’s also one that can be fraught with difficulties. The author has worked very hard to write the book you’re editing, and there is a lot of energy and emotion invested in it. The last thing you want to do is charge in with a red pen and no decorum. I generally follow four basic rules when doing my favourite part of the job:

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