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Pan Macmillan wellness imprint Bluebird publicly shared its plans for a "kinder, more caring and even more delicious" 2018 at a bash in central London attended by authors Joe Wicks, Annabel Karmel and Natasha Devon, among others.
Media, retailers, charity partners and friends gathered at the Soho Hotel on Thursday evening (14th September) for drinks and canapes and to hear about highlights from the year ahead.
Bluebird’s line-up included "The Body Coach" Wicks, whose sales for the past 18 months recently surpassed 2.3 million books, and new Bluebird author Jasmine Hemsley, whose first solo cookbook, East by West, is published this November. The line-up also included children’s cookery author Karmel, who recently signed a two-book deal with Bluebird after a stint self-publishing, as well as mental health campaigners Devon and Jonny Benjamin, behavioural change therapist Shahroo Izadi, Nordic food writer Signe Johansen, chef and model Isaac Carew, and Andy Ramage and Ruari Fairbairns, the founders of the "One Year No Beer" movement.
The evening was presented by The Pool’s Marisa Bate, and Bluebird took the opportunity to celebrate its publishing partnership with online platform The Pool.
(L-R): Jonny Benjamin MBE, Britt Pfluger, Natasha Devon MBE, Susie Pearl, Isaac Carew, Jasmine Hemsley, Andy Ramage, Joe Wicks, Ruari Fairbairns, Signe Johansen, Shahroo Izadi, Annabel Karmel MBE (credit: Mark Allan)
Adding to its tranche of mental wellbeing titles, Bluebird has brought on board authors such as Benjamin, known for his search for the man who talked him down the day he intended to take his own life on Waterloo Bridge, and mental health campaigner Devon. It is also publishing Shahroo Izadi's debut book The Kindness Method, a book that seek to help rehabilitate harmful habits.
In cookery, Hemsley presented her new cookbook East by West, exploring her passion for the ancient food philosophy of Ayurveda; How to Hygge writer Johansen presented her new cookbook Solo: The Joy of Cooking for One, and Carew, who has walked for Valentino, Hermés and Moschino during the course of his modelling career and was classically trained in the kitchen, talked about how he is returning to the kitchen with his first cookbook The Dirty Dishes. Bluebird also used the event to mark the joining of cookery author Karmel, who has announced she will be publishing her next book Real Food Kids Will Love with the imprint in June 2018.
Wicks chatted with Marisa about his next and fifth book The Fat Loss Plan, arriving just after Christmas. The social media superstar surpassed two million sales this year and was recently awarded a Golden Pan to mark the publishing house’s 70th anniversary.
Guests were invited to help themselves to the Bluebird library at the venue and were gifted with goodie bags of organic dark chocolate, Pukka teas, East by West recipe samplers and copies of Russell Brand’s Recovery and the first book on the latest mindfulness trend Calm Calligraphy.