Tag: christmas wishes at the chocolate shop

The one with some Black Friday & Cyber Monday offers on my books

Jessica Redland Author2 Comments

Hi everyone, how was your weekend? Have you been bagging yourself some bargains in the Black Friday sales? There wasn’t anything I particularly needed but I have enjoyed some of the reductions applied across the board like 20% off all TU Clothing at Sainsbury’s, 30% (or 3 for 2 instore) at Paperchase and 20% off Accessorise. When you want to get some Christmas gifts or need to stock up on some office supplies, those discounts to everything are most welcome.

Anyway, I have some discounts on my books to bring to you.

Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes is on a 99p Kindle deal for TODAY ONLY (Monday 28th November). This is part of a Black Friday Goldbox so there’ll be lots of other great offers on other books running alongside it.

You can get it here. To find out more, the blurb is at the bottom of this post.

Staying with the Christmas titles, Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop is in Audible UK’s Cyber Monday sale which starts today and ends tomorrow. They’re offering it for the bargain price of £1.99 across these two days.

You can find it on Audible UK here. The blurb is also at the end of this post.

If you’re not an Audible subscriber already and are thinking of giving it a try, now’s a great time to do so as they’re currently offering the first 4 months at a 60% reduction. Bargain! It’s one of those auto renewals so do watch out for that if you only want to participate in the trial.

You can also find Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop for 99p on Kindle UK at the moment – find it here – and it’s in the Kindle Australia monthly deal, ending on Wednesday. You can find it in Australia for only $1.29 here.

And a reminder that the first and final books in the Hedgehog Hollow series – Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow and Christmas Miracles at Hedgehog Hollow are free in Prime Reading at the moment and also 99p for Kindle so there are several great offers available.

And if you’re a Kindle Unlimited subscriber, ALL my books are FREE on KU. Woo hoo!

Big hugs and happy reading/listening
Jessica xx

CHRISTMAS AT CARLY’S CUPCAKES:

It’s the most wonderful time of the year…


It’s December on Castle Street; the fairy lights are twinkling, snow has settled and the festive season is in full swing.

For Carly, the owner of Carly’s Cupcakes, it’s the busiest time of year getting everyone’s Christmas treats ready on time. However with her clumsy sister, Bethany, as a co-worker, it’s proving a difficult task. They say you shouldn’t mix work with family. Maybe they have a point…

As Christmas approaches, Carly is also eagerly awaiting the return of her best friend to Whitsborough Bay. Liam has no idea he’s been the object of her affection since their schooldays. After years of pining after him, can Carly pluck up the courage to finally tell him how she really feels by 25th December?

Could a little festive magic make all of Carly’s wishes come true this Christmas…?

A heartwarming, short festive story of friendship and family from bestseller Jessica Redland. You can find out what happens to Carly next through exploring her best friend Tara’s story in Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café. 


CHRISTMAS WISHES AT THE CHOCOLATE SHOP:

Sometimes you just need a little Christmas magic to make your wishes come true…

When master chocolatier, Charlee, takes the leap to move to the picturesque seaside town of Whitsborough Bay, she is determined to follow in her grandfather’s footsteps and set up a chocolate shop.

Luckily, she finds the perfect location for Charlee’s Chocolates on beautiful Castle Street… Now she just has to refurbish it in time for Christmas!

With a useless boyfriend and countless DIY disasters, Charlee doesn’t know if she’ll make it in time. With no ‘traditional’ family to support her, she feels lost in her new surroundings and the secrets of the past are weighing her down.

But the warmth and festive spirit of the Whitsborough Bay community will surprise her, and when plumber, Matt, comes to the rescue, it might be that all of Charlee’s dreams could come true this Christmas, and she could learn what family really means…

Escape to Castle Street for the perfect uplifting, festive read from top 10 bestseller Jessica Redland.

The one where (nearly) all my Christmases come together

Jessica Redland AuthorLeave a comment

It’s November and even though we still have an autumnal event approaching with Bonfire Night on Saturday, it’s officially the approach to Christmas in my mind.

I love Christmas books. I love writing them. I love reading them. I love gazing at their gorgeousness on bookshelves and having that warm and fuzzy moment seeing all the snow, trees, gifts, and hugs in those white, blue and red covers. Awwww.

My Christmas on Castle Street series has just been released as an eBook Boxset which you can download for Kindle UK here. This contains all three of the books in the series:

  • Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop
  • Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes
  • Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café

There’s also some bonus content of book club questions/wonderings for each book and various blog posts I prepared picking up on something relevant to each book, and a couple about the overall series which give some additional insight into my inspiration, research and thoughts on Christmas on Castle Street.

The Boxset retails at £7.99 which is a small saving on buying the books individually at £2.99 each.

There is one Christmas book which isn’t included in the Boxset because it doesn’t belong to that series and that is my Christmas 2022 release: Christmas Miracles at Hedgehog Hollow. This is the final book in the six-book series and has just been reduced to 99p on eBook.

Christmas Miracles at Hedgehog Hollow is also available in Prime Reading, as is the first book – Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow – so you can get them both for free if you’re a Prime Reading subscriber. And, if you’re a Kindle Unlimited subscriber, you can get ALL my books for free via that service.

Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow is also 99p at the moment for anyone not in Prime or KU.

Happy Christmas reading.

Big hugs
Jessica xx

Escape to Castle Street for the perfect uplifting, festive reads from top 10 bestseller Jessica Redland.

This boxset contains all 3 books in the Christmas on Castle Street series:
1. Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop
2. Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes
3. Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café

★ Also Bonus content included ★
– Book club questions for each book
– Blog posts for each book
– Christmas Lights on Castle Street blog post
– Hot Chocolate and Cake on Castle Street blog post

—–

Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop

When master chocolatier, Charlee, takes the leap to move to the picturesque seaside town of Whitsborough Bay, she is determined to follow in her grandfather’s footsteps and set up a chocolate shop.


Luckily, she finds the perfect location for Charlee’s Chocolates on beautiful Castle Street… Now she just has to refurbish it in time for Christmas!

With a useless boyfriend and countless DIY disasters, Charlee doesn’t know if she’ll make it in time. With no ‘traditional’ family to support her, she feels lost in her new surroundings and the secrets of the past are weighing her down.

But the warmth and festive spirit of the Whitsborough Bay community will surprise her, and when plumber, Matt, comes to the rescue, it might be that all of Charlee’s dreams could come true this Christmas, and she could learn what family really means…

Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes

It’s December on Castle Street; the fairy lights are twinkling, snow has settled and the festive season is in full swing.


For Carly, the owner of Carly’s Cupcakes, it’s the busiest time of year getting everyone’s Christmas treats ready on time. However with her clumsy sister, Bethany, as a co-worker, it’s proving a difficult task. They say you shouldn’t mix work with family. Maybe they have a point…

As Christmas approaches, Carly is also eagerly awaiting the return of her best friend to Whitsborough Bay. Liam has no idea he’s been the object of her affection since their schooldays. After years of pining after him, can Carly pluck up the courage to finally tell him how she really feels by 25th December?

Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café

Everyone is getting into the festive spirit on Castle Street – snow is falling, fairy lights are glistening and Christmas shopping is underway.


But for Tara Porter, owner of thriving cafe, The Chocolate Pot, this is the most difficult time of the year. From the outside, Tara is a successful businesswoman and pillar of the community. Behind closed doors, she is lonely.

With a lifetime of secrets weighing on her shoulders, she has retreated from all friends, family and romance, and shut her real self away from the world. Afterall, if you don’t let them in, they can’t hurt you. She’s learnt that the hard way.

But as the weight of her past becomes heavier and an unexpected new neighbour moves onto the street – threatening the future of her cafe – Tara begins to realise that maybe it’s time to finally let people back in and confront her history. It could just change her life forever…

The one with TWO more books going into The Works

Jessica Redland AuthorLeave a comment

I’m delighted to announce that another two of my books have gone into branches of The Works. Woo hoo!

My seventh title to go in is Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop which is the first book in the Christmas on Castle Street series but can be read as a standalone as it’s connected to the other two by virtue of being a business in Castle Street at Christmas. My eighth title is Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café, which is the first book in my Starfish Café series.

I’ve been watching for them appearing online so I could share a link with my news but they still don’t appear to be on the website. However, my daughter went into our Scarborough branch earlier today and reported back that they were in stock there so, as I needed to go into town anyway to drop off my accounts, I’ve just been to sign them.

They only arrived with Tuesday’s stock but half of them have already sold through. The Scarborough branch gets ten copies of each and there were five of Christmas Wishes left and only four Snowflakes. I suspect the remaining ones will sell through pretty quickly as they often do because the staff are so great at promoting me as a local author to anyone browsing the books, bless them.

An enormous thank you to Boldwood Books for securing this for me and to The Works on for being so amazing to have taken so many of my books over the past two years.

The shelves were a little bare as they’re waiting for loads more winter book deliveries so I’m feeling very honoured to be among the first on the shelves. If you do spot either or both of them in your local branch of The Works, please do let me know on social media and I would love to see a shelfie (photo of them on the shelves) as it’s so exciting to see them out and about. And if you’re Scarborough-based and manage to grab yourself a signed copy, do let me know too.

Oh, and Mum, I took my special pen you gave me to sign them. Thank you xx

Big hugs
Jessica xx

The one where most of my books are 99p on Kindle UK TODAY ONLY

Jessica Redland AuthorLeave a comment

Hello and welcome to Boxing Day. How was Christmas Day? If you were celebrating, I hope you had a fabulous time.

I’m really excited today as seven of my books are on a very special offer on Kindle UK. It’s known as a ‘gold box’ and is only available on a Sunday for eBooks. To be eligible for a gold box offer, an author must have at least six books with the same publisher and they need to have been retailing at £2.99 for at least two months before the 99p gold box deal is secured so that readers are genuinely getting a good offer.

You can usually spot which author has a gold box deal because, late on Sunday afternoon and into Monday morning, those books are usually doing very well near the top of the Kindle charts. This is because they’re featured in the Kindle newsletter and on the daily deals pages and heavily marketed by Amazon themselves.

Yesterday, there was a special Christmas day gold box on the Cadfael series of books by Ellis Peters. At one point yesterday evening, I spotted a whopping 19 of the 21 books in the Top 50. Wow! That’s serious chart domination! They’re still riding high this morning as I’m writing this although they’re back up to the £3.99 price now so they’ll drop position later. There’s always a lag in the sales figures having an impact on the chart.

Unusually, today’s gold box is a joint Boldwood Books one with Jennifer Bohnet who has four of her titles in the deal alongside my seven and it looks like another Boldwood author, Rosie Clarke, has a daily deal with Stormy Days on Mulberry Lane.

My gold box books are:

  • Making Wishes at Bay View (Welcome to Whitsborough Bay book 1)
  • Finding Hope at Lighthouse Cove (Welcome to Whitsborough Bay book 3)
  • Coming Home to Seashell Cottage (Welcome to Whitsborough Bay book 4)
  • Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café
  • Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow (Hedgehog Hollow book 1)
  • New Arrivals at Hedgehog Hollow (Hedgehog Hollow book 2)
  • Family Secrets at Hedgehog Hollow (Hedgehog Hollow book 3)

We’re not really sure why book 2 in the Welcome to Whitsborough Bay book – New Beginnings at Seaside Blooms – wasn’t selected alongside the rest of the books in the series but it’s less than £6 for the full four-book series, even paying full price for that title, which is still a great deal.

With book 4 in the Hedgehog Hollow series – A Wedding at Hedgehog Hollow – out on 6th January, this is the perfect time to catch up with the three books in the series so far but only pay the price at which one book usually retails. Even though each book in this series is a complete story, it’s a far richer reading experience starting from the beginning and watching the characters develop across the series.

All my Christmas/seasonal books are on a 99p offer at the moment too, although not part of the gold box deal. These will probably stay at 99p until at least the end of December but the gold box is ONE DAY ONLY. There is a slight possibility that Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café may stay at 99p a little longer as Amazon had been price-matching that to an Apple Books offer but I wouldn’t take that chance:

  • Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café
  • Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop
  • Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes

So you can pick up a whopping TEN of my books on Kindle UK for only 99p each today – £9.90 total.

For another £7.77, you could add in the three books that aren’t on offer just now – New Beginnings at Seaside Blooms, All You Need is Love and The Secret to Happiness meaning you’d have the entire Whitsborough Bay collection and Hedgehog Hollow series released so far – 13 books – for £17.67, averaging £1.35 each. SUPER BARGAIN!

You can get to my Amazon UK author page here where you’ll be able to find all my books.

I’ve seen so many of these gold box deals secure astonishing chart positions, albeit for a brief window of time, and I’m trying not to get too excited about the idea of seven books in the Top 50 together or even Top 20 success. My absolute dream would be a book in the Top 10 in the UK. I’ve managed that in Canada and Australia but #14 is the highest I’ve had in the UK Kindle charts with Seaside Blooms when it was on a Prime Deal last year. None of the other books in the Welcome to Whitsborough Bay series have been in the Top 100 so it would be amazing if they got there.

I’d be ever so grateful if you could share the news if you’re UK-based or have friends/family in the UK who might like to take advantage of this offer. Wishing Rosie Clarke all the best with her daily deal and Jennifer Bohnet every success with her four gold box books. Go Boldwood!

Big gold hugs
Jessica xx

The one where I have lots of lovely things to celebrate in this troubled world

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In a world where so much continues to be confusing and frightening, I’ve been making the most of the happier things that have happened across the past week: adding the finishing touches to the Christmas decorations, a phenomenal semi-final on Strictly, a glowing report from my daughter’s virtual parents’ evening and a lovely day out to a stately home with an author friend.

The past week has brought much to celebrate in my writing too…

REVIEWS MILESTONES

Today, I hit a fabulous milestone for two of my books. Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café passed 1,500 reviews/ratings on Amazon and Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes hit 2,500.

I’m absolutely delighted! It shouldn’t be long before I’m celebrating Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop hitting 1,000 and Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café reaching a whopping 3,000. The former will probably get there by the weekend and the latter will hopefully make it by the end of the year.

Isn’t it funny how all four of my seasonal books will hit an exact milestone at around the same time?

DOUBLE TOP 100 SUCCESS

I was absolutely delighted to see Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café and Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop in the Kindle Top 100 in the UK at exactly the same time. They danced around each other a bit at the bottom of the chart with Christmas Wishes passing Starfish Café on one occasion.

Although Christmas Wishes didn’t stick around in the Top 100 for long, it was wonderful to see Charlee’s story there. Starfish Café has done me so proud, hanging around in the Top 100 fairly solidly since mid-November and peaking as high as #56.

There was also some success for Christmas Wishes on the Apple Books chart with a Top 10 position in the Fiction & Literature Chart and Top 100 in the overall chart too.

#BOLDBOOKCLUB

Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café was selected by Boldwood’s reading community as their choice for the very first #BoldBookClub which started with a readalong this week. There’s a book club question posed each day and various competitions and giveaways running so do pop over to Instagram – look for @BookandTonic – to join in.

I’ve been delighted with the buzz and the amazing answers to the book club questions so far. Tonight, there was an Instagram Live where 3 amazing bloggers – Fiona, Meena and Jav – joined me to ask questions and I did a quick reading. You can find the Live here. A huge thank you to Fiona, Meena and Jav for the great questions, to Claire for keeping me right with the technicalities (newbie here!) and to all those who stopped by.

FAVOURITE READS OF 2021

It’s the time of year when book bloggers/reviewers start sharing their favourite reads of the year.

Joanne from Portobello Book Blogs delighted me with the news that All You Need is Love was one of her top reads of the first quarter of the year! Wow! It’s one of my favourite books that I’ve written so this was a particular honour for me. You can find the blog post here. Thank you so very much, Joanne.

Then yesterday I received the amazing news that Claire at Book Lovers Anonymous (find her on Facebook here) had announced her top 5 books of 2021 out of 300 she’s read and A Wedding at Hedgehog Hollow was at #5. It isn’t out until 6th January but Claire, as a blogger, had an advanced copy so it fell into her 2021 reading.

Claire wrote, “fantastic addition to a phenomenal series. I love Samantha and I hope the series never ends”. Awww!

The good news didn’t end there as Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café also featured in her top 5. At number 1!!!!! Eek!!!! I am so thrilled.

Claire wrote, “Another fantastic book by the super talented Jessica Redland [pauses to blush and pinch self]… Honestly, never has a book made me feel so much emotion, and it will be a book I will love forever”. Seriously, I was welling up reading that!

Claire sent me a badge to put on my website so hopefully I’ll remember how to do that and get it added soon but here it is in the meantime. Isn’t it pretty?

Thank you to everyone who has played any part in all these wonderful things. I appreciate it so very much. It’s still hard to believe that this time three years ago, I was at my lowest ever point with my writing and seriously questioning whether to call it a day. Writing is who I am so I knew I could never really let go but it was so hard back then. So to anyone for whom life is tough just now, who’s facing challenges, who’s feeling low, hang on in there as I’m living proof that time can change everything. Stay strong, stay safe, and stay believing in yourself.

Big hugs
Jessica xx

The one with all the amazing deals on my festive reads

Jessica Redland AuthorLeave a comment

It’s two weeks today until Christmas Day! Eek! I am unbelievably disorganised this year. I had an unusually busy diary in November and an editing deadline and it has completely knocked everything out for me. The trees are up but there are still boxes everywhere still which need clearing today. I’ve had a couple of fairly unsuccessful shopping trips so still have some gifts to buy. My daughter’s birthday is 6 days before Christmas so we need double the ideas for gifts from us, both sets of grandparents, my brothers and my husband’s sisters. I met up with my side of the family last weekend and was organised enough to take their Christmas cards with me but I haven’t written any others. I think it’s going to need to be a busy Christmassy catching-up weekend for me.

Speaking of Christmas, there are some fabulous deals on my four festive books right now. Three of these books are in a series although each works as a standalone book:

  1. Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop (formerly Charlee and the Chocolate Shop)
  2. Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes
  3. Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café (formerly Christmas at the Chocolate Pot Café)

These are part of a series called ‘Christmas on Castle Street’ but it’s really only a series connected by the fact that they’re all set at Christmas in businesses on Castle Street. However, this is the order they’re written in and the businesses and characters get mentioned in subsequent books so there are some small spoilers if you read books 2 and 3 out of order but nothing much if you read book 1 out of order.

My latest release – Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café – is the start of a brand new series but is a complete story with no cliffhangers. It mentions Christmas and it has chapters set on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day but this is more of a seasonal book than a Christmas one and has a very different feel to the other two.

In the UK, these books are on various deals which should keep them all at 99p throughout December. They are this price on Kindle and Apple Books and three of them are 99p on Kobo but Starry Skies is £2.99 on Kobo at the time of writing this.

In the USA, there are offers on three of the four reads on Kindle. At the time of writing this, Starry Skies was $3.99 but prices do sometimes change as Amazon price matches. Apple Books currently has different deals. Starry Skies and Christmas Wishes are both $0.99, with the Starfish Café and Carly’s Cupcakes at $1.99.

In Canada, there are some fabulous Kindle offers on all four books. The current Apple Books offers are the same as shown below for three of them. The only exception is that Starfish Café is currently $1.99 on Apple.

And finally to Australia, there are also great deals to be had. All four of these books are currently $1.99 on Apple Books Australia.

So loads of amazing deals to be had in all these territories although do bear in mind that prices can change, particularly on Amazon as they frequently price-match other sites.

Happy festive reading!

If you’ve already read these but have friends/family members/colleagues/neighbours who you think will enjoy them, please do spread the word!

Right, best get into Christmas mode and try to get organised!

Big festive hugs
Jessica xx

Children in Read for Children in Need

Jessica Redland Author1 Comment

Children in Need is the BBC’s Corporate Charity whose “mission is to help ensure every child in the UK is safe, happy, secure and has the opportunities they need to reach their potential”. Every year in November, there’s an appeal show – 19th November this year – but there are various other activities which happen in the run-up such as the Countryfile Ramble.

For the past 7 years, the Children in Read campaign has run to raise valuable funds for this charity through an auction of lots provided by authors, illustrators and publishers.

You can find the full auction here.

At the time of writing this post, there are a whopping 740 lots available covering a huge variety of genres, and therefore catering to all tastes. £14,365 has already been raised but, with 18 days still to go, that will hopefully significantly increase.

There are books donated, limited editions, signed copies and a whole host more. Here’s a screen shot of the different filters you can search on…

I have donated lot 594 – a signed and dedicated set of the three ‘Christmas on Castle Street’ paperbacks – which you can access directly here. The series consists of:

  • Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop
  • Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes
  • Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café

My lot currently has 7 bids on it and is at £25 which is fabulous … but, as each book retails at £8.99, that’s less than these could be bought for if purchased separately outside the auction! Hopefully it will rise a little higher for the charity.

Over on Twitter you can find the appeal on @ChildrenInRead Please do bob on over and share the links all over the socials to help boost the bids on all these amazing lots. Could be fabulous for a spot of special Christmas shopping!

Big hugs
Jessica xx

Thank you to everyone involved in the blog tour for Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop

Jessica Redland Author1 Comment

The blog tour for Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop drew to a close yesterday, With 48 stops scheduled over 16 days, it was another epic one.

An enormous THANK YOU to Rachel Gilbey from Rachel’s Random Resources for organising the tour and to all the amazing reviewers/bloggers who took part, generously giving their time to read the story, compose their review, and share it on the socials.

I’m delighted to report that this was another really positive tour. Yay!

There were a couple of no-postings and I hope those reviewers are doing okay as I noticed they haven’t posted anything for a little while. Sending hugs if they’re poorly or having a difficult time just now. There was also a promotion post only post which meant 45 reviews were shared. 

Not everyone gives a rating on their posts, but I do manage to track some down when the review is also shared on Amazon around the same time. The 35 ratings shared (or sleuthed by me) were all positive with 22 x 5-star, 3 x 4.5-star, and 10 x 4-star. It’s such a thrill when every single rating is a positive one.

It was a delight to read reviews from those who’ve read several or even all of my books, noting how much they loved being back on Castle Street and among friends. For those who were new to my work, there were several comments about checking out past and/or future books which is fabulous.

There were a couple of reviewers who had read this book in its original incarnation of Charlee and the Chocolate Shop and I was delighted to read that they loved the revised (and expanded) version even more.

Some reviews were so lovely that they made me quite tearful. It’s such an honour to have such prolific readers say so many wonderful things about my writing and my abilities as an author. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I do firmly believe that recommendations are the best way for an author to succeed so I appreciate every single one of these kind reviews. You are all superstars.

Wishing you all the best.

Big hugs
Jessica xx

Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop is going on a blog tour

Jessica Redland AuthorLeave a comment

Although Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop (previously independently released as Charlee and the Chocolate Shop) was published by Boldwood Books on 3rd August, we decided that the height of summer probably wasn’t the ideal timing for a blog tour of a Christmas book so we held back.

With the arrival of the colder weather, the darker nights creeping in, and the shops stocking their Christmas goodies, the blog tour starts today (12th October 2021) and runs until 27th October.

Across sixteen days, there’ll be a whopping 48 stops (3 a day). Looking at the schedule, it’s lovely to see so many regulars – really flattering as it means they love my books enough to keep coming back for more – but also a delight to see some newbies. Hopefully they’ll love Charlee’s story and become converts!

A huge thank you to Boldwood Books for enabling the tour, to Rachel Gilbey of Rachel’s Random Resources for organising it, and the wonderful 48 bloggers/reviewers taking part.

And, on the subject of Rachel, congratulations to her for being a finalist in the Media Star of the Year category in the RNA (Romantic Novelists’ Association) 2021 Industry Awards. You can read the RNA’s announcement here.

Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop is book 1 in the Christmas at Castle Street series. Books 2 and 3 – Christmas at Carly’s Cupcakes and Starry Skies Over The Chocolate Pot Café were released last year.

All three books are complete standalone stories but books 2 and 3 are closely connected as the two businesses are next-door to each other and the two business owners, Carly and Tara, are good friends. They follow on chronologically and there are therefore a couple of spoilers for Carly’s story if reading Starry Skies first although plenty of readers have read them the other way round and still loved them.

Although Christmas Wishes is the first book in the series, it can be read before or after the others. The heroine – Charlee Chambers – and her shop do appear in the other two but there aren’t any spoilers for her story.

Big chocolatey hugs
Jessica xx

Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop

Sometimes you just need a little Christmas magic to make your wishes come true…

When master chocolatier, Charlee, takes the leap to move to the picturesque seaside town of Whitsborough Bay, she is determined to follow in her grandfather’s footsteps and set up a chocolate shop.

Luckily, she finds the perfect location for Charlee’s Chocolates on beautiful Castle Street… Now she just has to refurbish it in time for Christmas!

With a useless boyfriend and countless DIY disasters, Charlee doesn’t know if she’ll make it in time. With no ‘traditional’ family to support her, she feels lost in her new surroundings and the secrets of the past are weighing her down.

But the warmth and festive spirit of the Whitsborough Bay community will surprise her, and when plumber, Matt, comes to the rescue, it might be that all of Charlee’s dreams could come true this Christmas, and she could learn what family really means…

Escape to Castle Street for the perfect uplifting, festive read from top 10 bestseller Jessica Redland.

Thank you to everyone who joined the blog tour for Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café

Jessica Redland Author2 Comments

It has been the biggest blog tour one of my books has ever been on, the biggest blog tour my amazing publishers Boldwood have hosted, and I believe it may be the biggest our fabulous tour organiser, Rachel Gilbey, has arranged.

It wasn’t that we set out to organise an epic-sized tour for the release of Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café – simply that an unprecedented number of reviewers stepped forward wanting to take part. How flattering is that?

The stats:

  • 18 days
  • 54 scheduled stops
  • 52 posts (it’s possible that an Insta one from yesterday may come in late but I didn’t want to delay my thank you)
  • 50 reviews and 1 promotion post
  • 3 additional bloggers not on the tour sharing their reviews

When a tour schedule is released, it’s always exciting to spot reviewers with whom I’m familiar, ranging from those who’ve loved and championed my books from the start to those who’ve discovered my writing more recently and have clearly loved it enough to come back for more. And it’s always a little nerve-wracking seeing new names. Will they like my work or discover it’s not really for them? There were several new names on this tour.

I was also a little nervous about this book. I absolutely love this story but it’s by far the most emotional one I’ve written. I had to remortgage the house to pay for all the tissues I needed when writing it so I was fairly sure many reviewers would shed some tears. And they did. Some readers love books which make them cry but others don’t and I do understand that. I’m not going to say anything more about this for now as I feel a separate future blog post on the subject coming up.

So, back to the blog tour. Of the 41 reviewers who gave a star rating with their review (or who posted it on Amazon or NetGalley with one which some sleuthing revealed), 33 gave it 5 stars, 2 gave it 4.5 and 7 gave it 4-stars. Wow! This made me and my mum (who loves to read all my reviews) very, very happy.

Some of the reviews said such wonderful things not only about this book but about my ability as a writer that I was close to tears reading them. I’ve also found some new readers who loved the story so much, they want to check out my backlist, which is amazing.

Alongside this, I’ve received direct messages from readers and been tagged into posts on social media with such lovely comments about Hollie and Jake’s emotional story and am delighted it has touched so many readers.

THANK YOU to everyone who has taken part in the blog tour, reviewed the book outside the tour, sent me a message, posted about it on social media and/or recommended the story to friends and family. I am so appreciative of all the love and support.

THANK YOU to the amazing Rachel Gilbey from Rachel’s Random Resources for organising the tour and sharing all the reviews on Twitter.

THANK YOU to Boldwood Books for making all of this possible, especially my editor Nia Beynon without whose editorial insights and encouragement, the story wouldn’t be what it is today and it wouldn’t have had such phenomenal comments.

I’ll be returning in October on a blog tour for Christmas Wishes at the Chocolate Shop. Although it was published at the start of August, it’s very much a Christmas read (Starfish Café being more of a seasonal read than specifically Christmas) so we thought it made more sense to have the tour nearer to Christmas.

In the meantime, thank you once more. I’ve read, loved and appreciated every word.

Finally, if you haven’t read Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café yet but like the sound of this story, I’ve put Amazon links in this post and pasted the blurb below. Hope you take a trip to The Starfish Café… but make sure you have the tissues hand.! Probably best remove the mascara too!

Big hugs
Jessica xx

The blurb:

Welcome to The Starfish Café – where you will find stunning views, delicious food and lifelong friendships.

Two broken hearts.

Since she inherited The Starfish Café, Hollie has poured her heart into the business, striving to keep her mother’s traditions and warm-hearted spirit alive. But behind closed doors Hollie is searching for true happiness as she grieves the tragic loss of her family who were once the beating heart of the café…

An unexpected meeting.

Jake lives by two rules: don’t let anyone get close and don’t talk about what happened. Little does he know that a chance meeting at The Starfish Café, facilitated by a fluffy lost dog, is about to turn his world upside down…

The chance to love again.

Can Hollie and Jake break down the barriers that have been holding them back from finding love and happiness, before Christmas comes around? After all, with courage, nothing is impossible…

Join top 10 bestseller Jessica Redland for a magical winter at the seaside, where love blossoms and lifelong friendships are made.