His Hidden Wife Hits Amazon Top 50!

I apologise in advance for the fact that this is going to be an incredibly excitable post... for many reasons.

The first is that a week ago, my fourth psychological thriller, His Hidden Wife, was published by Bookouture. That's four books in just over two years! I have to admit that although I was passionate about this book, it was a hard one to write. So much so that when I handed it over to my editor, I knew something was off but I was too close to it to know what it was. 

There were two parts to the story (a present day story and a story set twelve years earlier) narrated by different people. After a week or so, my editor came back to me and told me she knew what was wrong: the story set in the past wasn't necessary. It needed to come out. Yes.. all of it!

I could have cried but my lovely editor had worked with me on my three previous books and got it right so I knew I had to trust her judgement. I had to have faith that at the end of it, my book would be a stronger one even though the amount of work needed seemed overwhelming.

So began several weeks of structural edits, followed by several more of line edits that were almost as hard. They were, by far, the most difficult edits I've had to do for any of my books and I'll be honest and say that, at times, I wondered if I could do it. I even wondered, at my lowest point, whether after I'd finished, I'd ever want to write another book. 

But I carried on and eventually saw the light at the end of the tunnel. When I'd finished, I read the new version and thought: Do you know what? This isn't bad at all.

Thank goodness I wasn't the only one to think so because, a week on from publication day, His Hidden Wife has become an Amazon Kindle Top 50 bestseller (peaking at #43). It is number one in the Hot New Fiction charts in both the UK and the US and has sold more books in the first week than I ever could have imagined.

The picture at the top of the page is of me signing books for my local bookshop. I have to pinch myself to believe it! At the moment they're only taking phone orders from customers but I'm looking forward to taking some photos in the shop once they open again. It's a gorgeous little bookshop and one I share with Julia Donaldson (who lives in the same village) who can often be found signing her children's picture books in school holidays.

My books have always done better in the UK than in the US so it was particularly gratifying to find that the book raced up the Amazon charts across the pond as well. I am so very grateful to everyone who bought and shared and reviewed as I certainly couldn't have done it on my own.

You can buy His Hidden Wife here

This was the second publication day I've had in lockdown so I knew that I wasn't going to be having a huge celebration. Instead, I had a mini publication party with my friends via Zoom, drank Prosecco and scoffed the delicious cakes and biscuits my publisher sent me.

And what of the next book? Let's just say it's going well and when it's published at the end of the year, I'm hoping I'll be able to celebrate in (non-lockdown) style!
 

Cover Reveal for His Hidden Wife

Just a quick post today as I have recently had the cover reveal for my next psychological thriller, HIS HIDDEN WIFE. My fourth thriller! How did that happen? It doesn't seem any time at all since my debut was published. Time certainly works in mysterious ways when it comes to writing books.

I actually think that seeing the cover for the first time is the most exciting part of the publishing process and I've been delighted with all of them. 

Every single one.

In fact, I'm still trying to decide which one is my favourite... maybe this one (but then I say that every time a new book comes out).

I'm really lucky because I've had the same cover designer for each of my novels. She uses a different colour combo for each and makes sure the 'motif' is strong: a pair of children's shoes, a pink hair band, black and white flowers and now a set of rings. Each giving a hint of what is to come in the book.

She also always uses the same font for the title and author name. This is so that when readers see it, they will, hopefully, recognise it as part of the Wendy Clarke 'brand'. Branding was mentioned a lot when I first signed with my publisher, Bookouture, but it's only now I have four books that I can definitely see what they mean. Don't they look lovely together... not that I'm biased or anything!

 

His Hidden Wife will be published by Bookouture on February 4th but you can pre-order it right now (only if you want to, of course!)

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