Last year, as a result of having seen my talk Organising Chaos: Turn a Messy Draft Into a Publishable Novel, with Sophie Beal, director of Cadence Publishing, Rhea Gamble hired me as her editor for her debut novel, Void, the first volume of the Bonds of Ballendor trilogy.

So it was a delightful surprise when Rhea sought me out at this year's Bournemouth Writing Festival, excited to show me a copy of Void…

Today is one of those full circle moments. A year ago Sacha Hughes came to the talk Organising Chaos: Turn a Messy Draft into a Publishable Novel which I gave with the director of Cadence Publishing, Sophie Beal, at the Bournemouth Writing Festival. Sacha came to speak to me afterwards, a conversation which led to my editing her debut novel, Love, Grief & More Sex Than Pinot. That novel is published today. Not only that, but the official launch is at this year's Bournemouth Writing Festival on 26 April.

So, full circle. I am currently editing Sacha's second novel, and Sophie and myself will be Organising Chaos again at the Bournemouth Writing Festival on 25 April.

Clouds Over Bowland by Rosemary Sturge, the first novel under the new Cadence Timepiece imprint, was published on 2 April. Cadence Publishing is a very small Bournemouth-based press co-founded and now directed by Sophie Beal, while I am the editor-at-large. We are very proud of Clouds Over Bowland, our first novel for adults and our first historical novel.

'...a wonderfully written, well-researched, engaging and unusual story,highlighting a part of England and a period of history that is often overlooked. I loved the characters, enjoyed the insight into Quakerism and reached the end wishing I could stay with the story for longer.'

I grew-up knowing who the celebrated primatologist (and later environmental campaigner) Jane Goodall was, so I assumed everyone else knew too. There were always copies of the National Geographic magazine in our house. Though the only ‘foreign’ countries mum ever visited were Scotland and Wales, she was fascinated by maps and loved the National Geographic. When she won a prize at school she chose an atlas.

We weren’t well off growing-up and the National Geographic was, as a beautifully produced glossy American import, expensive. But back in the 1960s and ‘70s there always seemed to be piles of cheap copies in charity shops and in secondhand bookshops. Mum bought them. We both read them. Jane Goodall was often featured. Obviously this beautiful woman who graced the cover was famous.

On 10 March I found myself in the rather unusual position of being published in an anthology with some of the most acclaimed and bestselling authors in the country. It’s a little less impressive when you know that other than our names, the anthology, Don’t Steal This Book, is blank. But nevertheless, I can legitimately say I have been published in the same volume as, take a deep breath, Cecelia Ahern, Jeffrey Archer, Pam Ayres, Andrew David Barker, Antony Beevor, Malorie Blackman, William Boyd, Gyles Brandreth, Ramsey Campbell, Jonathan Carroll, Ann Cleeves, Caroline Criado Perez, Lindsey Davis, Imtiaz Dharker, Inua Ellams, R. J. Ellory, Sebastian Faulks, Anne Fine, Lucy Foley, Michael Foreman, Michael Frayn, Patrick Gale, Jane Green, Philippa Gregory…

So how did this come about?

Having been the most successful daytime event at the Bournemouth Writing Festival last year, I’m back again this year with the director of Cadence Publishing, Sophie Beal, giving the latest version of our talk, Organising Chaos: Turn a Messy Draft into a Publishable Novel. We will be in the Ocean Theatre, Pavilion Dance South West, at 3.15pm on Saturday 25 April.

Cadence Publishing is a very small press co-founded and directed by Sophie Beal. As editor-at-large with Cadence I'm delighted to post the cover for our second novel, Clouds Over Bowland, by Rosemary Sturge, and the first under the Cadence Timeline historical fiction imprint. The actual cover reveal was on episode 23 of the Beneath the Page podcast, which Sophie founded and co-hosts with author Steve Couch, and on which episode I'm the guest.

Passion vs Profit – Inside a Small Press is a talk I'll be giving with Sophie Beal, director of Cadence Publishing, on Saturday 28th at the Royal Bath Hotel in Bournemouth. The talk is the latest in the monthly An Author's Perspective series presented by bestselling psychological thriller writer Alex Stone's Author Events:

As Clouds Over Bowland, the new novel by Rosemary Sturge, prepares to launch, Cadence Publishing opens its doors…

From the Romance Writing Festival Bournemouth:

Editor Gary Dalkin will be joined by indie publisher Sophie Beal for their hugely popular Organising Chaos talk at this year's Romance Writing Festival!

Gary and Sophie have delivered their talk at the Bournemouth Writing Festival three times and each time it has gone down a storm. So we are delighted that they will reprise their session especially for romance writers and authors getting to the end of their manuscripts.

With colleague Sophie Beal I recently recorded an episode of Writing Magazine’s The Write Club Podcast for their digital platform, Writers Online.. The episode went live on 11 November, and this is how Writers Online described it:

Gary Dalkin & Sophie Beal on turning messy drafts into great novels

In this episode of The Write Club Podcast, hosts Beth and Mary are joined by Gary Dalkin and Sophie Beal - the creative duo behind Organising Chaos: Turn a Messy Draft into a Publishable Novel.