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The Bridgerton Effect.

Posted on 1st July, 2024

I have watched most of the Bridgeton episodes apart from the recent series – I watched three and then gave up. As a writer of authentic Regency books initially I couldn’t watch them at all as they weren’t accurate historically. However, I decided to see them as an alternative universe, forget they were supposed to be a historical drama, and then enjoyed them for their lavish costume, witty script and attractive characters.
I know a lot of people think the sexy scenes are wonderful but for me they were too long and too explicit – I think that’s probably more my age than anything else.
However,I think that there’s now something called the Bridgeton effect and publishers have started publishing more Regency books and four of mine will be up later this year. That’s great – but not all Regency books are just romantic comedy in costume – mine certainly aren’t, but having covers that remind readers of Bridgeton drives sales to the books.
What do you think? Would you be disappointed if you picked up one of my books and found there was no sex, that it’s more Jane Austen than Julia Quinn but the covers reminded you of Bridgeton?
I trust my publisher to market my books in a way that gets them the most attention and the best sales but I wonder if following a trend might be counter-productive if it puts off the readers when they discover the book they’ve downloaded isn’t what they expect..
Of course every writer wants their books to be successful, for readers to enjoy them, but  promoting books as similar to a current trend when they actually aren’t could be counter-productive I would hope that any reader picks up my books thinking they are like a Julia Quinn will still read them and enjoy them, but that might not be the case. They can, of course, return them to Amazon – it remains to be seen if that happens when my books come out in the autumn.

I’d be interested to hear your views on this?

Fenella J Miller