Me again with two posts in one day! Aren’t you lucky?!
Just a quickie to say a huge thank you to everyone who has left me a review or rating on Amazon because the six Hedgehog Hollow books combined have today just passed 20,000 reviews/ratings (20,023 at the time of taking the screen shots below). Oh my gosh! Go hedgehogs go!
I can’t quite believe this figure. Back during my five-year struggle, I longed for my eight books to get 200 reviews between them so to have six books getting 20,000 in the space of a little over two years is beyond my wildest dreams.
There are reviews elsewhere, including a large number on Audible, so thank anyone who has left a review anywhere, but it is particularly this whopper of a milestone on Amazon that I wanted to celebrate today. Eek!
In October last year, I hit a sales milestone I never ever dreamed I’d achieve – half a million sales. This was for sales achieved through Boldwood Books only and not any sales achieved through my previous publisher or as an indie author. Having said that, there’d have been little impact if I added them in. To celebrate the half a million milestone, I did some number crunching and discovered that I’d sold less than 10,000 copies of my books during the 4 year 2 month period pre-Boldwood and across the transition period of a year during which some of my books were still available as indie titles before they had an edit and re-release through Boldwood.
I wrote a blog post at the time all about my journey, the struggle to make sales, and how exceptionally grateful I was to everyone who’d supported me on my journey. I don’t want to repeat everything on this post so, if you’re not familiar with my five-year struggle, you might like to check out that post here. If you’re an aspiring/struggling writer reading this, it may give you some encouragement that it can still happen. I’m living, breathing proof of that!
Eight months later, I am stunned to have achieved another milestone. For sales up until the end of May this year, my Boldwood releases have hit three quarters of a million. Woo hoo!
The latest Hedgehog Hollow book – Chasing Dreams at Hedgehog Hollow – wasn’t released until late June so it isn’t included in this graphic.
Next stop: One million! Eek! At this rate, hopefully I’ll be celebrating that milestone in early(ish) 2023.
I’m so incredibly grateful to my amazing editor, Nia Beynon, the team and authors at Boldwood Books, and anyone who has bought, borrowed, downloaded any of my books in any format, and those who have reviewed and recommended them. You continue to help make my dreams come true and inspire me to keep those books coming.
On a different note, I have a couple of audio offers on at the moment. If you’re an Audible UK subscriber, Finding Hope at Lighthouse Cove and Spring Tides at The Starfish Café are in the 2 for 1 credit sale so why not use your credits to get them both. Lighthouse Cove is the third book in the Welcome to Whitsborough Bay series but the first two are actually FREE to subscribers as part of Audible Plus so you can listen to almost the whole series for such a bargain. Spring Tides is the sequel to Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café which was on an offer recently.
This morning, it was a special moment to see Spring Tides in the Audible Top 50. THANK YOU! (It says ‘books’ below but this means ‘audiobooks’ on the behind the scenes information.)
My latest release – Chasing Dreams at Hedgehog Hollow – which was released just over seven weeks ago (28th June) has just hit 1,500 reviews/ratings on Amazon.
Not only is this a milestone for the fifth book in the series but it’s also a milestone for all my books because every single one of the UK releases now has at least 1,500 reviews/ratings on Amazon. I find this quite astonishing because it seems only yesterday when I had only one title approaching 100 and was longing for the others to pass 40! Thank you Boldwood Books for finding me readers and for everyone who has read any of my books and shared the book love. I’m so very grateful.
I’ve done a little number crunching and here are a few discoveries on AMAZON. These are just the UK editions:
Most reviewed/rated book:Snowflakes Over The Starfish Cafe with 5,794. This was helped by being in Prime Reading at the start of the year
Most reviewed/rated book in the Hedgehog Hollow series: I still find it a little weird that it isn’t the first one. The most reviewed is book 2, New Arrivals at Hedgehog Hollow, with 4,840. Incidentally, book 3, Family Secrets at Hedgehog Hollow, is the next most reviewed at 4,598. Book 1, Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow, has 3,766
Least reviewed/rated book: Aside from Chasing Dreams which has just hit the 1,500 mark, it’s book 3 in the Welcome to Whitsborough Bay series – Finding Hope at Lighthouse Cove – with 1,565. If we’re going to be really pedantic, the series box set actually has the least reviews but, as it the amalgamation of four titles, I’m not classing it separately
Average rating: Every single book has either a 4.6 or 4.7 average. That’s a lot of love out there for Whitsborough Bay (including The Starfish Café) and Hedgehog Hollow
Overall number: I’m so close to an astonishing 50k milestone. I have 49,658 reviews/ratings overall. Eek!
OVER ON AUDIBLE…
Most reviewed/rated audiobook: The Secret to Happiness is the most reviewed/rated with a whopping 3,903. The next closest is Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow with 1,887. Both these titles are free to subscribers as part of the Audible Plus programme which has led to more listeners trying them so it’s not a surprise they’re the most reviewed although it’s interesting how far ahead The Secret to Happiness is
Least reviewed/rated audiobook: This is Spring Tides at The Starfish Café with 274. Chasing Dreams is ahead of this with 313
My books are on Kobo, Apple and various other sites too but most sales come from Amazon and Audible so I have only explored those for now.
THANK YOU to everyone who has left a review or rating for anything of mine they’ve read or listened to. It’s a lovely way to say a thank you to the author for a book you’ve loved, and on Amazon that activity kicks in their algorithms so massively helps with visibility.
Spring Tides at The Starfish Café– the second book in The Starfish Café series – was released on 5th April and has been on a blog tour. Officially the tour ended on Tuesday but there were a couple of bloggers unable to post on time so I wanted to watch out for those before I posted my thank you. And I was away on holiday and it’s so much easier being on my bigger screen at home.
I was a little apprehensive about how the blog tour of Spring Tides might go as the first book in the series – Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café – had been so well-received. Many of the positive comments were about how emotional the book was, really drawing readers in.
The second book isn’t anywhere near as emotional because readers already know Hollie’s and Jake’s sad stories and this is about them moving forward. Thankfully, the verdict was really positive.
I’ve included some quotes from across the tour. I loved reading every single review so if I you were a blogger on the tour and I haven’t included a quote from you, please be assured it wasn’t that I didn’t like what you had to say. These are all randomly selected from the ones I’ve been given (and I don’t have visuals from all the posts).
Thank you to Rachel Gilbey from Rachel’s Random Resources for organising the tour on behalf of my fabulous publisher Boldwood Books and to all the amazing bloggers/reviewers who took part and shared their lovely comments about the story and my writing. It’s appreciated so much.
Thank you also to several fabulous bloggers/reviewers who kindly posted reviews during the first fortnight outside of the official blog tour and to all the readers who have posted reviews and ratings. At the time of writing this post, there are over 800 of these on Amazon which is so amazing.
I’ve been blown away by how well this book has done. Pre-orders in the first week put me into the Top 3 on the Bookstat E-Book chart shared by The Bookseller. This chart is made up of sales of eBooks, print books and audio titles online. Most charts record physical book sales only so it’s wonderful that this chart exists and an honour to be so high. The last two Hedgehog Hollow books made it into this chart but I think they were both #6 or #7. Having said that, the sales volumes were very similar – possibly higher – so where a title appears in this chart is very much around what else is out at the time.
Two and a half weeks since release, the eBook is still in the Kindle Top 100 and the Audible Top 100 which is such a thrill. These amazing reviews and recommendations will have helped it stay there.
Book three – Summer Nights at The Starfish Café – will be out on 3rd April 2023 and is available for pre-order on Kindle here now. It will be available in other formats nearer the time.
Thank you again for all the book love for Spring Tides at The Starfish Café. It’s made for a very happy month.
On the fortnight anniversary since the release of A Wedding at Hedgehog Hollow,the blog tour has finished. Actually, it officially finished yesterday but one of the posts hadn’t appeared so I wanted to give until the end of today to see if it did. Sometimes a time difference can mean delays or a reviewer might be caught up with work or life and be a little late, although sometimes the review doesn’t appear at all.
I used to panic about ‘no-shows’ on a blog tour thinking it was a sign that the reviewer hated my book and couldn’t find the words to convey how much… but I gave myself a stern talking to, realising it very likely was nothing to do with the book at all.
The amazing bloggers/reviewers who are involved in the tours do this because they love books and want to share that love. They do this alongside day jobs/ family commitments/ caring responsibilities/ illness/ and a big pile of other responsibilities. And sometimes they just don’t get the opportunity to read the book. Or they read it but don’t get the opportunity to write a review. Stuff just gets in the way. And I completely understand that and would hate to think that anyone might ever feel stressed about missing their date. Reading should be a delight.
We had 41 stops scheduled across 14 days and, although there were 3 no-shows, there were 6 lovely posts from bloggers not on the tour so we’ll include them and call it 44 stops. There were also several reviews on Instagram outside of the tour too for which I’m very grateful.
I usually do some sleuthing to try to track down the star ratings for those who haven’t given one with their reviews but I’m really against it with a writing deadline so I haven’t done that this time. The stats are:
26 x 5-star
2 x 4.5-star
1 x 4.25 star (it was an 8.5/10)
4 x 4-star
11 x no ratings given (so I’m going to call them all 5-star ha ha ha!)
My favourite star-rating (which I’ve counted in the 5-star stats) has to be 5 billion. Thank you to Ceri’s Book Blog for that!
There was a lot of love out there for A Wedding at Hedgehog Hollow and for the series in general – as you can see from a random selection of the quotes I’ve included in this post – which warmed my heart so much across the cold January days!
There were some reviewers for whom this was the first visit to Hedgehog Hollow and others who’d read the whole series and had been eagerly awaiting the resolution of that massive cliffhanger from Family Secrets at Hedgehog Hollow and it was interesting to read the perspectives from both.
An enormous THANK YOU to all the bloggers/reviewers who participated. I always try to comment on all blog and Instagram posts but sometimes I’ll miss an Insta if it’s in addition to the blog post and I haven’t been tagged in so I do apologise if I have missed any. And a huge THANK YOU as always to the fabulous Rachel Gilbey from Rachel’s Random Resources for organising it all on behalf of my amazing publisher, Boldwood Books.
I’m writing the 5th book in the series at the moment and it’s a relief to see there’s certainly appetite for more from the cast of human and spiky characters at Hedgehog Hollow. Chasing Dreams at Hedgehog Hollow will be out on 28th June and is available for pre-order on Kindle now (other formats will be up for pre-order later).
And not forgetting the amazing members of my own reader’s group, Redland’s Readers who’ve shared such kind feedback about this latest instalment. You’re very welcome to join us on Facebook. It’s not a book review group as there are fabulous groups who already do this so well already. It’s simply a warm and friendly space to talk spoiler-free about my books and settings and share pictures of hedgehogs, the seaside, beach huts and bears – all lovely things relating to my books – and to get a few insights into the world of publishing.
It’s publication day today for A Wedding at Hedgehog Hollow. Woo hoo! I’m so excited (and also a teeny bit nervous) as those hedgehogs make their way out into the world for the fourth time.
The blog tour kicks off today so an enormous thank you to the fabulous Rachel Gilbey for organising this and to all the amazing bloggers/reviewers who have volunteered to take part and share their views.
Some participants have read some or all of the books and, for others, this will be their first trip to the rescue centre. Early reviews coming in suggest that the book can be read as a standalone which is true. I carefully craft all of my books so that a complete story is being told within that book.
However, nearly all of them say they wish they’d read the others first to get the full feel of all the family dynamics. I’m not geeky enough to number-crunch on it but my first impressions are that this fourth instalment has attracted a huge number of 5-star reviews but a large proportion of the 3 or 4-star ones are from readers who’ve not read the previous books and therefore haven’t had the richer reading experience of following the threads that travel through the series. It’ll be interesting to see if this trend is reflected in the bog tour reviews. Having said that, a 4-star is still amazing. The hedgehogs and I will take that!
You can get hold of A Wedding at Hedgehog Hollow here:
Last year, I wrote a really detailed blog post looking back over 2020, broken down into the highs and lows of each quarter in what was a very strange year for us all. It was really interesting reading it earlier so I decided to replicate something similar for 2021.
I’ve just spent three hours working on it, pulling together everything that happened across the year, and I’ve lost the will to continue. Not because there aren’t amazing highs to share or that it isn’t interesting to look back but simply because I think it’s more interesting for me than my readers. So I’ve ditched it.
Instead, I’m going to write a much shorter thank you post to those who have made 2021 another special year for me professionally.
Thank you in no particular order to:
Everyone who has supported me and my books this year. To my readers and listeners, thank you so much for buying, borrowing, streaming, reviewing, promoting, and recommending some or all of my books
Anyone who has participated in a blog tour (especially those who’ve joined them all) and to the amazing Rachel Gilbey for organising these
Readers/reviewers who have named one or more of my books as their favourites of the year. What an absolute honour!
Bloggers/reviewers who’ve kindly featured me on their blogs/websites as a guest this year
Readers who’ve sent me messages or emails telling me what my stories have meant to them
The amazing members of my Facebook community, Redland’s Readers, who share their love of the worlds I’ve created and gorgeous pictures of hedgehogs, lighthouses, the sea and so on
The Boldwood readers community who voted for Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café as the first #BoldBookClub readalong and shared their thoughts, and to the fabulous Claire Fenby for creating this
Sharon Booth, super talented author, for friendship and encouragement
The Write Romantics, my original writing family, for friendship and support through the highs and lows of our journeys – Jo Bartlett, Sharon Booth, Jackie Ladbury, Deirdre Palmer (also writes as Zara Thorne), Lynne Pardoe, Helen Phifer, Helen Rolfe, Rachel Thomas, Alys West
All the fabulous authors at Team Boldwood, most of whom I’ve only met virtually, for being so friendly and supportive
New friends I’ve had the pleasure of meeting this year including the lovely Eliza J Scott
A wonderful community of authors who’ve been shared posts and been amazing in the author community. Too many to name but I specifically want to shout out to Sandy Barker, Kim Nash (aka Kim the Bookworm) and Ian Wilfred who have done so much for me and other authors this year
My mum for being my biggest fan who shows unwavering interest in everything that’s happening with my books
My brilliant husband Mark for being the most supportive and understanding husband ever, and our gorgeous daughter Ashleigh for never moaning about how much time I spend drifting off in my fictional worlds
Everyone involved in the process of getting my books to the market – Cecily my copy editor, Sue my proofreader, Debbie my cover designer and Megan at Boldwood preparing all the books for digital upload and distribution
The amazing team of narrators and distributors at ISIS Audio and Ulverscroft
The amazing library staff who’ve stocked and promoted my books/audiobooks, especially Middlesbrough Libraries who had me as their author of the month during December
The Works for taking another two of my books this year and specifically to the manager Jamie and her fabulous team at The Works Scarborough for being so welcoming and promoting my books to their customers
The RNA (Romantic Novelists’ Association) for championing romantic fiction and challenging the appalling snobbery this genre receives
The best editor in the world ever, Nia Beynon, for editing excellence, empathy, and encouragement. Fifteen books down, nine to go… and hopefully many more after that!
And last, but by no means least, the whole team at Boldwood Books for another amazing year. Five more books released, three of them brand new, and sales of half a million earlier this year have been phenomenal. Amanda our CEO continues to drive an innovative, inspirational publisher where the author is at the centre of everything they do. I can’t wait to see what new ideas 2022 brings
I hope 2021 has brought you kindness and happiness, despite the continued strangeness and I send you best wishes for 2022. Hope the year starts well and brings dreams and wishes fulfilled.
Big New Year hugs Jessica xx
I’ll finish with a gallery of some of this years writing-related highs including five new releases, two books into The Works, an Italian translation, an amazing competition in conjunction with Lucy Pittaway artist, and so much more …
I’m delighted to say that all four books in the Welcome to Whitsborough Bay series have now passed the 1,000 reviews/ratings milestone on Amazon and want to thank every single reader who has taken the time to leave a review or rating, especially if it’s a positive one!
Book 1 – Making Wishes at Bay View – was the first to get there quite a few months ago and has already passed the 1,500 milestone, next stop 2,000. This made sense to me as the first book in a series is often the most widely read.
Book 4 got there next – Coming Home to Seashell Cottage – and is well on its way to the 1,500 milestone now. Again, this made sense to me as, reading the reviews, quite a lot of readers have referred to the whole series as though they have perhaps just rated the final one.
It was therefore a battle betweenNew Beginnings at Seaside Blooms(book 2) and Finding Hope at Lighthouse Cove(book 3) as to which would get to 1,000 first. Seaside Blooms took that crown nearly a fortnight ago on 16th September and, at the time, Lighthouse Cove only needed seven more reviews to reach the milestone. But there were none the next day… or the day after.
Finally, today, book 3 was jubilant and hit the big 1,000.
Between the four books and the box set, there are well over 5,000 reviews/ratings on Amazon and 92% of those are a positive 4- or 5-star rating. I’m thrilled that readers have taken this series to their hearts and shown such love for Callie, Sarah, Elise and Clare’s stories.
No matter how many books I write, this will always remain an exceptionally special series for me as it’s where my writing journey started. I often get asked which my favourite book is and I love them all for different reasons.
Seaside Blooms, although book 2 in the series, is the first book I wrote so that will always hold a very special place in my heart. Seashell Cottage is probably my favourite story as I felt something shift in my author voice when I wrote that story, moving from a lighter romcom style into the deeper emotional women’s fiction category. Clare fascinated me as she arrived on the pages of Seaside Blooms all feisty, spiky and guarded and I didn’t know why. It was a wonderful thing unwrapping her story in book 4.
But I love Making Wishes because octogenarian Ruby is one of the most fun and fabulous characters I’ve ever created, and Lighthouse Cove has one of my favourite romances in it. So, yes, I love them all and I’m thrilled that readers do too. Thank you again.
A huge thank you also to my amazing publishers, Boldwood Books, and my brilliant editor Nia Beynon without whom I wouldn’t be celebrating milestones like this.
What a lovely start to the week. If you haven’t yet taken a trip to Whitsborough Bay, I hope you’ll be tempted to dive in.
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 Caféyet 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.
I’m celebrating a very exciting 1st book birthday today because it’s not just a book that was born but a series. Happy 1 year anniversary to the first book in the Hedgehog Hollow series, Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow.
I was nervous about the publication of this book on 2nd July last year because, until that point, every book I’d written was set in the fictional North Yorkshire seaside town of Whitsborough Bay. I knew readers loved that setting but it didn’t right for Hedgehog Hollow. I wanted my hedgehog rescue centre to be in a countryside rather than a coastal setting. I only hoped my Whitsborough Bay readers wouldn’t mind the change.
The great news is they didn’t. Phew! In fact, the series has hooked in a huge number of new readers who were drawn in by the hedgehogs. Many of them have then gone on to read the Whitsborough Bay books too which is lovely.
When I first decided to set a book in a hedgehog rescue centre, I imagined it as a standalone story. Silly me. I should have learned by now that I don’t think that way. I nearly always think bigger than a single plotline and manage to introduce a cast of characters, each of whom has their own story to tell and, before I know it, I have a sequel or a series on my hands. Hedgehog Hollow was no different.
In the first book, we meet my heroine Samantha and find out how she came to be the owner of Hedgehog Hollow. The hedgehog rescue centre doesn’t open until the end of the first book so it definitely needed a sequel to see her taking in lots of gorgeous rescue hedgehogs. But it would just be two books. Definitely. Although…
As I wrote book 2, New Arrivals at Hedgehog Hollow, (which came out in January this year) more stories emerged and there was no way I could end it at book two without ever telling them.
Family Secrets at Hedgehog Hollow was published in May this year telling one of those stories but there are plenty more to come. There will definitely be five plus a prequel. There may be six. There could be more! Some characters won’t have a book focusing on them because much of their backstory has come out in other books and I would only ever make a person a focus of a book if I feel that there is a good story to be told and a good story would not be regurgitating what the readers already know. For example, I don’t see Samantha’s mum Debs as a focus because readers already know a lot about her past *pauses as readers cheer because nobody likes Debs*
I wrote the first three books in the series back to back. I also worked on the edits for some of my backlist books in the midst of that, preparing them for re-publication through Boldwood Books. After writing book 3, it was time to take a break from Hedgehog Hollow as Whitsborough Bay was calling. Over the past few months, I’ve been writing Snowflakes Over The Starfish Café which is set just outside Whitsborough Bay. This will be out on 31st August and, true to form, there’s more than one story to tell. It will definitely have a sequel but it may become a trilogy.
It was good to have a break from Hedgehog Hollow but oh so lovely to return to the farm and my friends for book 4. I’m partway through writing A Wedding at Hedgehog Hollow which is out on 6th January 2022 but available for pre-order now.
I get so many messages and comments on social media from readers telling me they can’t bear the wait for book 4 and I need to write faster! This is exceptionally flattering, knowing that readers are clamouring to find out what happens next. That might have something to do with the unexpected cliffhanger I dropped at the end of Family Secrets at Hedgehog Hollow. The thing is, it can take readers a day (or less) to read a book but it takes just a smidge longer than that for an author to write one so I’m afraid there has to be a bit of a wait between books. Really sorry to those who are waiting patiently … or not so patiently! Don’t they say that all good things come to those who wait?
I love this series so much. I can vividly picture myself at the farm, sitting on Thomas’s bench, looking out over the wildflower meadow sowed by Thomas and Gwendoline with the farm cat Misty Blue draped across my knee. Every time I write a scene there, I can almost smell the flowers, hear the buzz of bees, feel the gentle breeze kissing my cheeks. It’s so tranquil. I keep telling my husband that I want to live in the real Hedgehog Hollow. Need a Netflix deal before that would ever be financially possible!
I’m so exceptionally proud of how well those hedgehogs have done in finding a place in readers’ hearts. The three books so far have sold over 120,000 units combined (i.e. a copy in any format) in the space of only a year and Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow is on its way to being the first of my individual books to join Boldwood’s 100k Club and will hopefully be there in the next few months. Go hedgehogs go!
The hedgehogs have scampered into the UK Kindle Top 100 for all three books, with Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow peaking at #31 and they’ve had some impressive positions on the Apple Chart with an amazing #2 for New Arrivals, Top 10 in Australia and New Zealand and Top 100 in the USA. The latter is especially impressive when there are no wild hedgehogs in the USA! Family Secrets also stormed the Apple chart with #5 in the UK and Top 200 in the USA.
But the thing I am most proud of is the reviews they’ve gathered and it is so fitting on the book birthday of the series that I am close to celebrating another milestone. Family Secrets at Hedgehog Hollow is just 15 shy of received 2000 ratings/reviews on Amazon and it hasn’t even been out for two months yet (released on 4th May). Hopefully it will even hit that milestone by the two-month anniversary.
I’ve never experienced anything like this. At the time of writing this, Finding Love at Hedgehog Hollow (book 1) has 2,291 reviews and New Arrivals at Hedgehog Hollow has 2,724 with a 4.7/4.6/4.7 average rating across them. Wow! The love is definitely there for the hedgehogs.
So as the hedgehogs and I party and celebrate one year of this new series, we would like to thank everyone who has made all of these achievements possible. In no particular order as everyone is extremely important in this list:
Readers and listeners without whom I wouldn’t be able to keep doing this. You are absolutely amazing
Bloggers and reviewers who have been on the blog tours or independently shared their kind words about the series
The gorgeous community on Redland’s Readers, my Facebook group for those who love my stories. You can join Redland’s Readers here if you’re a fan and want to immerse yourself in the worlds of Whitsborough Bay and Hedgehog Hollow
The lovely readers and admins on The Friendly Book Community and Heidi Swain and Friends – two gorgeously friendly Facebook book groups – for recommending and sharing the love for my books. Click on the names to link to those groups
The team at Boldwood Books, particularly my amazing editor Nia for her insightful feedback and her encouragement
The authors at #TeamBoldwood for their support
Emma Swan, James Dryden and Lucy Browhill for their amazing narration and ISIS Audio and Ulverscroft for the production and distribution of the audio versions
My tribe – the wonderful Write Romantics and the other talented authors out there who champion my work
My mum who is my number 1 fan and an absolute star
My Auntie Gwen, a hedgehog rescuer, for providing the inspiration in the first place
All the amazing rescue centres whether large scale or small around the country for the incredible work you do in helping protect these gorgeous creatures
If you haven’t already dived into the world of Hedgehog Hollow, the hedgehogs are waiting to welcome you. You can buy in a stack of formats – eBook for Apple, Kindle, Kobo, Nook, paperback, hardback (only book 2 and 3 at the moment), large print, audio and streaming via Spotify. And if you’re still not sure, here’s a couple of quotes from reviews, including ones from the audio version…
Jessica Redland Author 