The Willoughby Book Club Reviews 

I have bought a few subscriptions for presents and every time they have been thrilled and delighted

A beautiful and personal choice of books for my nephew. He looked forward to his delivery each month.

Excellent service, great variety of books that are looked forward to every month.

This subscription is the perfect gift for a child and really encourages reading with the thoughtful choices. Great customer service and well worth the money and I have bought several subscriptions as gifts now and everyone has been delighted.

Fantastic! I have had a bespoke subscription for myself and bought one as a gift. Service always very prompt and the books are beautifully packaged. Some really interesting, thoughtful choices and a treat to discover new authors this way. So impressed with the time and care put into the selections.

I love this service and have been surprised every month with a good book that we've enjoyed. This is the second time we've had a book subscription and I think we might set up a longer one in the future.

25485/150519/80

I bought this both for my Brother and Sister for their birthday presents. It really is the present that just keeps on giving. They were a bit skeptical at first as it's essentially a book to start with, but every month you get a new one without even thinking about it!! Would definitely recommend for birthday presents!! Thank you WBC!

I received a six month subscription for my birthday and I absolutely loved it! It was such a treat getting the books wrapped so nicely in the post and they were all from authors I hadn't heard of before but would definitely now try again. I would totally recommend!

This really is the perfect gift!!! My son was given a years subscription as a birthday gift and he absolutely loves it. We purchased a subscription for a family member and she has been so impressed with the books selected for her, as an avid reader I expected her to receive books she had previously read but she didn’t. I will be purchasing more subscriptions as gifts in the future, I’m now just hoping someone buys me one! :)

Purchased this for a colleague at work, he loves books and this was the perfect present.

Simple to add genres and what books he had read already!

All the books he received were ones he hadn't read and he's loved the ones which were sent!

Definitely recommend the book club

I'm not often one for leaving reviews. However, in this instance I feel compelled. It's long, so here's the point: The Willoughby Book Club's "literary experts" sent a book not worth the paper it's printed on for our 0-12 month daughter. Likely because no curation is put into the 0-12 month catalog.

Here's the long version:

My wife and I were gifted a 12 month subscription to The Willoughby Book Club after our daughter was born. We're currently in month two and received our second book. The first book is cute and someone spent time putting it together and illustrating it and that's great. I've enjoyed reading it to my daughter.

However, this month's book is a joke. The Willoughby Book Club claims that each month we will be sent a "book that's been handpicked to match their individual tastes by our team of literary experts." Obviously our baby's individual tastes are pretty basic. This book, "My First Colour" published by Chiltern Publishing should be immediately removed from the Willoughby Book Club's list of eligible books. The mere notion that any literary expert has ever even glanced at this book is laughable as anyone would be able to see that the amount of time and effort that went into "My First Colours" is non-existent.

Why? First and foremost, there is no author. Some person behind a PC slapped it together in 10 minutes. Even calling this thing a book is generous. The premise of the book is that each page highlights a colour and shows objects that are of the same colour. The images are collated together on a page and, if you take more than one second to look at the images you'll see that they were likely pulled straight from a Google image search. No effort was put into going into Photoshop and making the background of each image uniform. You can clearly see where images are edited and the off-white background in the original photo was left as is. Blue spoon, yellow lemon, purple balloon, and black/white puppies are the worst offenders, but many other images have a white background but with shadows cast underneath the image in question. No effort, care, or quality review went into this book by Chiltern Publishers.

Why does this matter? Isn't your issue with the book and not the Willoughby Book Club? Well, yes, my issue is that this book is garbage. It's not worth the paper is printed on and it makes me feel bad because some tree somewhere was cut down to make it. I expect there to be horrendous books in the world. That doesn't surprise me. What does surprise me is that the Willoughby Book Club claim that their "literary experts" "handpick" the books that are sent to recipients each month. Perhaps the Willoughby Book Club's "literary experts" perform better with books that have plot and characters and tell a story. Perhaps baby books are held a lower standard by the Willoughby Book Club because they are baby books. I'm writing this review because clearly no-one at the Willoughby Book Club has taken more than one second to see that this book is trash. Why? Because it took me two.

I feel bad for the very kind person who gifted us this 12 month subscription to the baby book club by Willoughby Book Club. On their website, currently, a 12 months subscription is 94.99 GBP. That comes out to about 8 pound a month. "My First Colours" sells at retail at 6.99 GBP. So this poor, kind person entrusted these "literary experts" to send us quality books for our child. They paid more than this book is worth at a retail shop because the idea would be that a "literary expert" would pick a quality book. Turns out The Willoughby Book Club is holding books in their stock that are such garbage that I feel compelled to write this review. It's laughable that The Willoughby Book Club claims to have "literary experts" who curate the books within their stock. It's a shame that someone paid The Willoughby Book Club around 8 pound for a 7 pound book that's not even worth a pound.

Hopefully this will spur the Willoughby Book Club to review their catalog of 0-12 month books. We've got 10 months more of books to be received for our daughter and I feel that, if "My First Colours" by Chiltern Publishing is the type of quality book that we can expect to receive, then I want to write an apology letter to the kind person who gifted us this subscription as it appears they've completely wasted their money.

If you've got a baby or know someone who does and want to get them some books. Just take the time to go out to a local shop and buy something yourself. You're just as likely as a "literary expert" to pick something for a baby that's worthwhile.

I bought a membership for my teen as part of their Christmas present & they have been thoroughly delighted with the books. When the books arrive each month, its a nice surprise in the post and they say it has been great discovering new authors that they would not necessarily have chosen themselves. The second book wasn't quite to their liking, but one email to WBC and this was rectified, all other books have been really enjoyed. We have recently extended their subscription as they are loving the books so much. A great idea for keen readers.

I have subscribed my two children (6 and 8), and subsequently my god-daughter (10) to the Willoughby Book Club and can hand on heart say it is a wonderful thing. The team ask you to fill in a small questionnaire to fill out some detail for the receiver, then at the beginning of each month they receive a very simply packaged parcel with their name on the outside (a big deal to a small child) with their personally selected book inside.

The books lean towards ones my two have not had or heard of before. I have seen some since in my local bookshop but I like that they are not 'bestsellers' so it leans them into books they may not pick up themselves, thereby broadening their reading.

I like the support of an independent source of reading, getting away from the the tedium of Amazon etc.

I follow WBC on Instagram and like seeing what they are up to and what readers have posted. I am thinking of setting up a subscription myself but I have quite a substantial reading pile at home to work through first.

Highly recommend.

I bought a subscription for my grandson aged 2 and was really pleased with the fact that the Book Club checked with me each month to make sure he hadn't already got the book they planned to send him. All the choices have been excellent and good quality and he looks forward to opening his book package each month.

I got a bespoke book subscription for my husband and The Willoughby Book Club was fantastic. They checked with me each and every book to see if my husband had read it and if I didn't think he would like it. Each book has come beautifully wrapped and he has liked then all!

I bought this subscription for my mother-in-law’s birthday and she absolutely loves it. She said she looks forward to the next book arriving each month and asked me to continue the subscription in lieu of all future birthday and Christmas presents. Thank you Willoughby book club!

Mostly great!

I bought a six month subscription for my friend for her birthday and gave a few books that she liked. She liked the books received, but... of the 6, 2 were dystopic zombie/end of the world based. Which, just, seems like a high number for a six month span. She liked them, but I think she was wondering how she came to have that many, and what i had put in to generate that. Maybe if there was an option to change the picks, if the recipient could get a check in half way through a subscription to change or maintain the books being chosen, that would be helpful. She liked the surprise each month, and receiving mail that wasn't a bill, just the end of the world content was a bit higher than expected.

I've bought gift subscriptions for my daughter and my step-mother, and they have both gone down really well. My bookworm daughter was so excited when the package came every month! I subscribed to the spoiler service and Lindsey emailed me each month to say which books she'd chosen for my daughter - they were all new to us and covered a wide range of genres. She introduced her to a few new series, and she has since read follow-ups to some of the books she was sent as part of her subscription. A great service and a great gift, which I'd thoroughly recommend.

These guys are great. I messed up my initial order and purchased the wrong subscription but they fixed it really quickly with no hassle or issues. They followed through with my specific request on book selection (nothing too girly!) and we were really impressed with the range of books we received; they were all beautiful and interesting and my niece loved them.

Excellent choice of books and a brilliant way of finding new and interesting reads that you may not have previously considered. Great for both a present for a loved one or a little treat for yourself!
Would highly recommend.
Also, the customer service is excellent. Prompt replies and simple instructions.