Stefan Holm publishes a romantic novel with a fiancée

Most people associate Stefan Holm with the Olympic gold in Athens 2004 or his four indoor WC golds. After the high jump career, however, another career has taken off – as a writer.

– I have always loved to read and always loved to write, says Stefan Holm in Efter fem.

The interest is shared with his fiancee Jessica Eriksson. Together, they have, among other things, written children’s books and audio stories that were broadcast in an erotic audio app. Stefan Holm has also published two books about his life as a high jumper, a quiz book about sports and a Lego book.

– We have a lot of fun together and laugh a lot together, says Stefan Holm.

“We don’t write erotica”

In 2020, the couple Holm and Eriksson announced that they were a couple on social media and about a year ago they got engaged in London.

Their upcoming book “Château at the End of the Road” is part of the Romance genre, whose target audience is women and often deals with a longing for love.

– We don’t write erotica, but more hot romance, says Jessica Eriksson.

– Erotica is even more direct and more focused on the sexual part, hot romance is a little milder, Stefan Holm adds.

Stepping from being a high-jump star and lecturer to writing about romance has been more of a given than they themselves could have imagined.

– If you think about it in retrospect, it feels braver than what they did in the meantime. It has felt quite obvious, but we slipped into this by accident, says Jessica Eriksson.

From elite athletes to romantics

Romance comes naturally to Jessica Eriksson.

– I am very romantic and Stefan is becoming more and more romantic all the time.

– As an athlete, you are incredibly self-absorbed, and perhaps you should be as an individual athlete. There is a lot of planning from when I will train, when I will compete and when I will eat and sleep. And then you might lose sight of the fact that there are other people in life sometimes, says Stefan Holm.

Stefan Holm is prepared to receive criticism after stepping into romance writing after his sporting career.

– When I won Olympic gold and received achievement medals, there was always an email telling me how worthless I was. Someone will probably write that about this book too, but then they can do it.