“RICK is in danger of being the best-selling author in this shop this year,” says Bookstop manager Nik Lowe after the hardback copies of Rick Astley’s book Never: The Autobiography have flown off the shelf.

The Newton-le-Willows born singer famed for his hit, Never Gonna Give You Up, penned his latest book for release this month, and at £25 each for a hardback signed copy, manager of community shop The Bookstop was unsure how sales of the book would go but the venue has had to order more after signed copies flew off the shelves.

The Bridge Street book shop also has a popular cardboard cut-out of the singer, which Nik adds has also proved popular, with him already having offers from ‘husbands of besotted wives’ who would love to have a cut out of their favourite singer.

He said: “Rick is in danger of being the best-selling author in this shop this year the way things are going.

“People are absolutely loving the cut out as well and getting pictures with it, I’ve already had seven offers for the cut out itself by husband of besotted wives type thing which I had to turn down.

“We can’t do that yet, so I think we’ll raffle it for charity eventually once the book sale hype has died down a bit.

“We got to meet him briefly at trade show and he was lovely so I’m not surprised the sales have gone well with him being from round here and we’ve had to order another batch.

“At £25 a hardback it is a lot so we were unsure how it would go, but St Helens loves him, so we’ve gone so ordered more.”