Richard, Judy and Oprah

For an author (with an exception or two), having a book picked by Oprah's book club is like winning the lottery. Being chosen by Queen Oprah almost guarantees an author royalty checks that will make them wealthy plus enough name recognition that their next couple of books will sell in numbers that would have seemed impossible pre-Oprah.

The same thing happens in the U.K. with the Richard & Judy book club. Richard and Judy have taken it one step further and now have a book club devoted exclusively to "summer reading," Richard & Judy's Summer Read. Ciar Byrne, in The Independent's book section details the impact, both good and bad, that these TV book clubs are having.

Since James Bradley's Gothic thriller The Resurrectionist was first published a year ago it has, to be kind, enjoyed modest sales. The tale of Edinburgh body-snatchers in the murderous era of Burke and Hare has sold fewer than 300 copies.

But that is apparently about to change. The title has been selected to feature on every author's holy grail: Richard & Judy's Summer Read. And unless he is very unlucky, Mr Bradley can expect can now expect to be selling 250,000 copies – much more than if he had won the Booker Prize.

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Following in the footsteps of the success of Oprah Winfrey's book club in the US, Richard & Judy now wield unrivalled clout in the publishing world, with its annual Book Club and Summer Read delivering a sales boost of more than 300 per cent. Featuring on the list does not come cheap, however. Publishers have to be prepared to discount their books heavily – typically by around 65 per cent – to get them into the front of book stores, and are also required to contribute towards steep marketing costs.

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Hazel Cushion, managing director of the Welsh independent publisher Accent Press, said: "They all come from large publishing houses, which shows how very hard it is to be selected.

"From an independent publisher's point of view, it's really ruined the fiction market. So many people only buy two or three books a year and now they're from the Richard & Judy selection and they're not prepared to look outside that."

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"The average Richard & Judy book has sold a quarter of a million copies, which is higher than the average Booker Prize-winner. A spot on Richard & Judy is better than winning the Booker."

I was particularly struck by the fact that The Resurrectionist, a book that has sold only 300 copies in a year, will now become such a huge publishing success. Think about that for a minute. It's still the exact same book although I suspect that now it will be repackaged to include one of those tacky Oprah-type stickers on its cover. And, although it's the same novel it was before winning the Richard & Judy lottery, it will now make millions and the author will become rich and famous. It's a crazy world.