Bloom’s BBC slot for author

Hollywood star reads out Littlest Dreamer on CBeebies

A Hollywood A-lister has given one of Hinckley’s most beloved children’s authors the best start to the year by reading out one of her books on a children’s nighttime programme.

Suzanne Smith, from Hinckley, is one of the trio behind Hattie B’s Magical Vet series - alongside Lindsay Taylor and Claire Baker - who in recent years have received many successes from their book’s magical fairytale adventures.

Yet Suzanne’s biggest surprise came on New Year’s Day when fictional pirate and movie star, Orlando Bloom, picked up her book Littlest Dreamer: A Bedtime Adventure and read it out to children across the nation.

Astounded over the news, Suzanne said: “My friend tagged me on a social media page on the very day of the broadcast so I didn’t have much time to spread the word, although it did make for a very exciting day and a great start to 2019.

“I was gobsmacked, very excited and super proud. I felt extremely honoured, a real life pirate reading a book that’s got a pirate in it, fancy that!”

CBeebies Bedtime stories is shown at 6.50pm every night as part of the channel’s bedtime hour and each evening a different celebrity or television personality snuggles down to read a story to little ones before bedtime.

Many famous faces have taken part including Tom Hardy, Jessica Ennis-Hill and Suranne Jones.

The book, which was published in February 2017, features adventures like saving your pet from the clutches of a fierce dragon to digging for pirate treasure, zooming around a racing track in a super-fast car and blasting off into space to play with aliens on planet Mars.

Suzanne said: “It was very exciting and I felt extremely honoured that such a high profile actor was reading my little story. The Littlest Dreamer books are very special to me so I got a bit emotional too.”

L itt lest Dreamer follows on from the success of Suzanne and her friends’ previous collections including Hattie B the Magical Vet, Doodle Girl which was illustrated by Marnie Maurri and Littlest Dreamer: A Bedtime Journey which are all available to purchase from leading book stores.

And will we be seeing more magical adventures by Suzanne?

She said: “Yes of course, It is however proving more difficult to compete with the volume of celebrity authors, but I won’t give up just yet.”

Hinckley children’s author, Suzanne Smith, was delighted to find out that one of her books featured on the CBeebies Bedtime Hour programme and was read out by Hollywood actor Orlando Bloom.