Embracing Failure by Hannah Jordan – Guest Blog and Giveaway

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Embracing Failure
The worst part of being a writer, for me, has always been the rejection. As a parenting blogger, I had internet trolls comment on my actual life, but that’s the price you pay for putting your words into the world. Over time, I grew a thick skin.

As a romance author, it’s my stories and characters that face criticism. No matter how thick I believe my skin to be, a critical review still hurts. I read them anyway. I want to continue to improve as a writer, so I read the comments and reviews—even the ones that break my heart a little.

At some point in my writing journey, I received this little nugget of wisdom:

If you’re not failing, you’re not striving.

Fearing failure keeps us from taking (or better yet making) opportunities. If every risk you take ends with success, you’re probably not reaching high enough. If only my friends and family read my novels, I wouldn’t have to worry about hurtful reviews. But then I wouldn’t be sharing my work with people beyond my social circle.

The second piece of advice that completely changed my view of rejection was this:

No doesn’t mean never. It means not this or not now.

Keep in mind, this one is specific to writing. If you ask someone out and they say no, move on. But if you submit to an agent and they say no, chances are they’ll consider a query from you for a different manuscript. They aren’t saying no to you. They’re saying no to the work because it’s either not what they want or not at a time they want it. The same goes for presses and publications. Often, you’re closer to an acceptance than you think.

For better or worse, rejection is an inherent part of a writer’s life. You have to learn to embrace it. Keep trying. Keep getting rejected. There’s a point where the dreamers stop and the gritty keep going. Learn from your mistakes, especially the ones that gut you, and move on.

When Rowan’s two-year marriage ends with a crash, she returns home to Peace Falls, VA, riding shotgun in her sister’s 1990 Cadillac hearse. Everything about her is damaged: her heart, her pride, her bank account, and her spine—thanks to a tourist, a Segway, and finding her husband getting busy with her boss. But Rowan is determined to reclaim her career and city life as soon as she recuperates and lands a new job.

Caleb “Cal” Cardoso didn’t notice wallflower Rowan in high school, but the former football star, and Peace Falls’s newest physical therapist, can’t take his eyes off the stunning redhead now. Too bad he’s sworn off relationships. After his last hookup purposely tanked his online reputation, Cal stands to lose his job if a single patient leaves his care. Which is why he can’t let Rowan switch to another practitioner, despite the friction between them, and why he definitely can’t act on his growing attraction.

Rowan agrees to remain Cal’s patient if he helps her younger brother train for football tryouts. Though Cal hasn’t touched a football since the accident that killed his best friend, he agrees, and as Cal helps heal Rowan’s body, she begins to heal his heart.

For You I’d Break is a small town romance with a hefty dash of spice, a HEA ending, and a cast of memorable characters, including a goth sculptor who secretly loves to decorate cakes, a fearsome-looking felon with a heart of gold, a hothead with a sweet side, a karma-devoted barista who collects damaged pets and first dates, and a lovable dog with more emotional sense than everyone put together.

Enjoy an Excerpt

Being a wallflower makes you thirsty, so parched for attention your heart feels brittle. Then after years—or in my case a lifetime—someone finally sees you. The exquisite feeling seeps deep, the attention saturating your life. So, you jump, headfirst. The red flags go unnoticed. Declarations of love tossed as lightly as petals. Maybe you marry him, like I did. Maybe you bloom in domestic bliss with a house in the suburbs and two adorable kids. Maybe a dog. Bare minimum a pet turtle.

I wasn’t so lucky.

After two years of marriage, instead of house hunting in the outskirts of DC, I was riding shotgun in my sister’s 1990 Cadillac hearse, headed back to Peace Falls, VA, with everything I owned stuffed where a coffin ought to be.

I’d cried so much in the past three hours, I could barely make out the foothills rising in the distance. My throat was raw. Crumpled tissues littered the floorboard, and lint covered my leggings.

The tears surprised me. Apart from a couple of late-night phone calls to my mother after I left the hospital, I’d held it together pretty well. I was too busy tying up the loose ends of my life in DC to feel anything but stressed. The moment Poppy arrived to drive me home, the tears started and built with every box, bag, and lamp we slid into the hearse.

About the Author Hannah Jordan grew up in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia but wound up in South Jersey after falling in love with her complete opposite. She’s got all the degrees of a “serious” fiction writer but only smiles when she’s writing romance.

She lives with her husband and two daughters in a picturesque town outside of Philadelphia where she enjoys reading in all genres, especially the spicy ones, and confusing people with her half-Southern, half-Northern accent.

The first book in her Peace Falls Small Town Romance Series, For You I’d Break, launched July 17, 2024.

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