That time I hosted a Reading Retreat

and here's how you can too...

In 2023 I had an itch to get in the car and drive. I wanted to travel around the country and spend a couple of weeks visiting some of the woman who I speak to on Instagram often, but have only ever met once or twice, if at all. Post-pandemic I was really craving time in the company of these women who had become close friends.

Realistically, it wasn’t possible. I have two small children, and a partner who works full time. I couldn’t just disappear with the car and leave them to it. So an alternative idea was born.

I decided I would hire a house for a long weekend and invite the women to gather there instead. That way we could all make a trip out of it together.

I called it The Reading Retreat.

The vision was a big house, filled with women, with nothing on the agenda but reading, relaxing, eating, and sleeping.

The trip took place last November, and I have spoken to many people since who want to do something similar but don’t know where to begin. So here’s everything I did to make this dream a reality:

The Guest List

I started by putting general feelers out on Instagram to make sure there was enough interest. About 50 people replied and said yes within four hours, so I took the story down and had a small panic.

I am in no way equipped to deal with arranging a trip for a group of that size, and I also knew I’d never be able to find accommodation for that many people that wasn’t a hostel type property. Those are great, but not the vibe I was hoping for.

But I did know I’d be able to fill spaces, so I booked a house and asked the first couple of people. Then I asked a couple of people who knew those people, then a couple of people who knew those people.

That way I ended up with 12 people who knew one or two people, but nobody knew everyone, and that was a great mix. There were no cliques or childhood besties, everyone embraced each other, and a lot of us felt like we were healing sleepover trauma.

(Side note: I’ll be brutally honest, this was the most stressful part of the experience. I hated feeling like I was leaving people out, and I still feel guilty about it to this day. But I’m hoping that sharing all of this information will inspire others to do something similar because if there’s one thing I now know, it’s that these type of trips are much needed!)

The Accommodation

My requirements were:

• A house with plenty of seating areas, ideally a few living rooms to snuggle up with a book in

• Enough bedrooms for one room per person. (Most people in our group wanted a room to themselves, but a couple opted to share a room.)

• Country vibes but not too remote - it’s nice to have things nearby for short trips out. The beach, a village pub, a foodie thing etc.

• Bonuses - hot tub, pool

We ended up at Northolme Hall in Lincolnshire, a large country house with 11 bedrooms and an indoor pool, perfect since we were visiting in November. It also had a large dining room, central kitchen, two separate living rooms, and a smaller separate cottage with it’s own kitchen and living room.

I adjusted the costs of bedrooms slightly so that double was highest, single was second, shared room was lowest.

We opted for 3 nights in November and as this was out of season it meant each person paid no more than £300.

The Money

I told people the costs upfront, as well as a breakdown of dates for payments.

I asked for balances at least a week before I had to pay the final amount, so there was a buffer if anyone is delayed.

If you’re organising a trip like this there might be times you need to shoulder the cost of something, particularly if, like me, you booked the house and then invited the guests. There’s a small risk there, but hopefully you’ll have a level of trust with the people you’re inviting.

Food and Drink

We agreed it would be nice to eat dinner together each night, but that everyone could make breakfast and lunch on their own schedule.

A few weeks before the trip we all jumped on a Zoom call and contributed to a shopping list, which I then ordered. We split the cost equally but covered our own alcohol since not everyone wanted to drink.

I placed a food shop order for delivery straight to the house to coincide with our arrival. However, this was also when I found out Tesco have a price limit on orders so I bought non-fridge stuff closer to home and left the rest (mostly cheese) on the delivery.

Make sure any allergies or dietary preferences are known by your whole group so nobody accidentally serves someone the wrong thing.

Several of our group are self-proclaimed people pleasers who love playing host to others, but I wanted to make sure we ALL got a chance to properly relax. With that in mind, I suggested we keep our food plans simple, so that nobody would be cooking for a long time.

We opted for a veggie chilli on our first night, a huge grazing table on the second night, and pizzas for the final night so clean-up would be minimal.

For lunches we threw jacket potatoes in the oven, had soup and bread, simple hearty meals for winter days.

We also had a snack bar. Everyone brought a few bits along and laid them out for us to help ourselves to, and since it was so close to Christmas the selection was incredible.

To be honest, we had far too much food for 12 people, but it came to about £40 each, and everyone had bits to take home too. More is good though, because nobody wanted to spent their relaxing weekend away doing an emergency trip to the supermarket.

Travel

Everyone was responsible for making their own journey to the house, but we shared locations in advance so people were able to life-share or pick up from train stations on the way.

Lil’ Treats

In the run up to the trip I started making my own treats hamper with my favourite snacks, some face masks, a new candle etc. Everyone loved this idea and started their own, which led to lots of our group treating themselves to new pyjamas too.

Many of the women on this trip are mums, some who have only ever had one or two nights away since they’ve had kids, so we loved spoiling ourselves for a change.

The WhatsApp group

I set up a WhatsApp group ahead of the trip to share updates as this was the easiest way for us all to communicate. It was so lovely to see photos of everyone en route on the day, and the chat has kept going since the trip.

Book Club

We agreed we’d use the first evening as a sort of book club, and that we’d all read the same book in advance. We put a couple of suggestions to a vote in the WhatsApp chat and settled on 28 Questions by Indyana Schneider

As not everyone knew each other before the trip, this was a great way to get conversation flowing, although it didn’t last long before we were chatting about pretty much every other subject under the sun.

Shared spreadsheet

I also created a spreadsheet with some local places to go, the meal plan, important details.

It’s a good idea to get an emergency contact name and number for each person, just in case there is an issue while you are away.

The week before

I invited everyone to share a little bit of a bio within the WhatsApp group which had two purposes:

1. It gave everyone a chance to share the ‘this is what I want people to know about me’ stuff before we arrived, and removed the need for us to do any sort of icebreaker on the first night

2. It meant everyone had a place to refer back to if they couldn’t remember some details but had that ‘I feel like I should remember this’ feeling

The unexpected result of this was that everyone went deep, fast, and everyone was very clear about their boundaries.

Two days before

I reminded everyone of the cut-off for additions to the food shop.

I asked everyone to reconfirm their emergency contact for the trip.

I sent a message asking if we could all give each other the grace to show up as we liked on this trip, and reminded them that since comfort was key nobody needed to feel like they had to get dressed or brush their hair before making an appearance. Thankfully everyone was on-board.

The day before

I checked the weather forecast and reminded the group to pack accordingly. Our trip was dry but cold, and we wanted to spend a little bit of time outside before coming back into the warm so wellies and big coats were a must.

While We Were There

I was very clear with the group that there was no itinerary or agenda (except for our shared dinners) which meant people could do what they wanted on their own schedule. However we did use the WhatsApp group (the house was massive) to say ‘beach walk in 30 mins?’ or ‘movie night in Holly’s room’ so people could join in with whatever they liked.

Before the trip I was most excited about having a really long lie-in, but funnily enough once we were there I couldn’t wait to get up and have coffee with everyone.

The Last Night

We all spent half an hour on the last night getting the house back into shape so there would be as little as possible to do on the morning of our departure.

The Aftermath

Immediately it didn’t seem like we could go on without making the Reading Retreat an annual event, so I can’t wait to do it all again this November in a different part of the country.

This was my personal experience of organising a group trip, and I want to emphasise that this was for fun with friends, not as a business venture. I would love if I could do this kind of thing every weekend, and have considered running more - but perhaps in future once my children are older.

If you’ve been dreaming of doing something like this, I say don’t wait around for someone else to suggest it, just make it happen.

Happy to answer any questions!

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Book News

I’m currently working on The No Rules Roommate, the sequel to Can I Tell You Something? (Ryan and Kayla’s story), as well as a secret third, fourth, and fifth thing, plus all of the admin that comes with being an indie author.

The downtime that comes with not having a new release to promote is something I’m learning to manage. Part of that means I’m spending the next month giving my first book, Just a Little Crush, some of the marketing love that she didn’t get when she was first released (because I really had no idea what I was doing).

If you’re after a short but sweet (and spicy!) romance about a cheesemonger, her firefighter friend, and the unfortunate accident that forces them to see each other in a new light then look no further. It’s out now on Amazon and Kindle Unlimited.

I’m also hosting a Q&A at The Meet Cute Romance Book Fest next month. It’s at Bushey Rose Gardens on Saturday 22nd June, and my session on Getting Started in Self-Publishing is at 1:30pm. There will be loads of talks and panels on the day so follow the Meet Cute Book Fest on Instagram to find out more.