Luxury train passengers brought to book on trip from Leeds
Author Milly Johnson will be joining the Northern Belle train from Leeds next month.
Champagne sipping passengers joining a Christmas Lunch trip from Leeds aboard one of the world’s most luxurious trains next month will have the chance to meet best-selling author Milly Johnson – and win her latest block-busting book.
Seven copies of her “Let the Bells Ring Out” novel will be given out aboard the Northern Belle – one in each carriage of the 1930s Pullman-style train which once formed part of the iconic Orient Express set-up.
And Barnsley-based Milly has promised to sign them for her fans as they tuck into a slap-up seven-course festive meal during a leisurely railway journey through the wintry Yorkshire countryside on Saturday, December 20.
She said: “I’m so excited to be making this trip because I used the Northern Belle as the inspiration for the luxury Yorkshire Belle train, which is at the centre of my new book. So it is appropriate that passengers will have the opportunity to win a copy.”
Her novel tells the story of seven strangers who find themselves marooned on the train over Christmas in the middle of nowhere after a massive blizzard closes the track.
A spokesman for the Northern Belle, which is owned by Huddersfield businessman David Pitts, said: “We’re delighted to have Milly travelling with us again on our Christmas Lunch special – especially as she has based her latest book on the train.
“I’ve read my copy already and I can heartily recommend it. It’s a Christmas cracker of a story.”
Most of the 270 tickets for the train, which leaves Huddersfield at 12.15pm on December 20 before picking up more passengers from Leeds at 1pm, have been sold.
But there are still a few single seats left and anybody interested should check out www.northernbelle.co.uk
This will be the Northern Belle's last trip of 2025, but the train will be back in Leeds and Huddersfield for a journey to Edinburgh on July 16 next year.
Then two days later there will be a steam-hauled excursion over the spectacular Settle-Carlisle line from York, Leeds and Skipton.