Tomorrow (Tuesday 12th July) will be a fortnight since book 5 in the Hedgehog Hollow series – Chasing Dreams at Hedgehog Hollow – was released and it has just completed a thirteen-day thirty-nine stops blog tour.

I’d like to say an enormous thank you to:

• All the bloggers/reviewers who took part in the tour
• A couple of extra reviewers who weren’t on the tour but who posted during this fortnight
• Anyone who has shared/retweeted any blog tour posts on social media
• Rachel Gilbey from Rachel’s Random Resources for organising and hosting the tour
• My publishers, Boldwood Books, for being generally fabulous

Even though Chasing Dreams is my sixteenth book, I do still get a little apprehensive ahead of blog tours, wondering how it will be received. I think there’s an additional pressure that comes with writing a series – especially one that has been loved as much as Hedgehog Hollow – as there’s the ever-present fear that the latest release will be the one that readers/listeners don’t like. As I read each review, I dread seeing the words ‘not as good as the one before’ and heave a sigh of relief when, for most, that’s not the case.

Fortunately the fifth instalment in the series has been very much loved and I was particularly thrilled that the first twelve reviews were all five-star. I don’t know what the thirteenth was but the next two were also 5-star so it could have been the first fifteen! Woo hoo!

There were two negative reviews (3-star) for this tour but they mainly gave positive comments. I’m very grateful that all the others were 4 or 5-star (mainly 5). I’ve just looked on NetGalley where there are currently 112 advanced reviews recorded and there is only one other 3-star on there (so far) which is from someone who hasn’t read any of the other books and was a bit lost. I therefore can’t help dismissing that one because joining a 6-book series at book 5 doesn’t make sense to me. There are no 2-star or 1-stars on NetGalley… yet! I can therefore conclude overall that the love for the hedgehogs is still there at book 5 because 3 negative reviews out of 112 reviews is pretty good going (2.6%).

I’ve put a random section of quotes in this post. There isn’t one from every reviewer who took part as I don’t have the complete set yet but wanted to get my thank you message out there first thing so I can crack on with writing book 18.

I really do appreciate the time it takes to read a book and gather thoughts into a comprehensive review and what I really appreciate on this particular tour is that none of the reviewers gave any spoilers away about Lauren’s story. I’m very grateful for that integrity and for allowing subsequent readers to discover it for themselves.

Thank you again to everyone who took part. The next blog tour will be in early September for the very final book – Christmas Miracles at Hedgehog Hollow – and I know many of those on this tour have already signed up for it. Hope you love the final instalment just as much.

Big hedge-hugs
Jessica xx