Welcome to Readers Write to Know! I asked you, my readers, what questions they would ask their favorite authors if given the chance, and the authors visiting my blog answered them! I’m always excited when I have a friend as my guest, and this week I’m so excited to have Jean C. Gordon as my guest on her release day! Her new book sounds SO FUN! I love the conflict she’s introduced between an OBGyn and a midwife. (As an aside, I, too, have ridden an elephant!) I very much enjoyed her interview and hope you do as well. Read on to see how you can get a free ebook from her AND enter to win her new release!
Tell us a little bit about yourself: Let’s see. I’m a native Upstate NY small-town girl. Pop, anyone? My husband and I tried city living in Los Angeles for college and returned home as soon as we finished. For the past 20+ years we’ve owned a small farm just south of Albany with our daughter and son-in-law and their two children. Our son-in-law raises pastured pigs. Our daughter is a Certified Nurse Midwife and a partial inspiration for my latest book.
I’ve always written, and until about six years ago, I held the Certified Financial Planner designation and wrote tax and financial planning articles for an international financial information corporation. Since 2017, I’ve gotten to write romance full time. Yeah! I’ve written for the multi-author Indigo Bay, No Brides Club, and coming soon, the Hopeless Romantics of Willow Ridge series, and Love Inspired, as well as my own ongoing series.
Although I write contemporary romance, as a reader, I love historical romance and historical novels. I may have read close to every book written about Mary, Queen of Scots. And some miscellaneous facts: I rode on the back of an elephant at an even at the local grocery store when I was a child. I love rollercoasters. I was once runner up for the Wyoming County (NY) Maple Princess. And my husband and I hope to take a tour of the Scottish Highlands for our anniversary next year. Anyone here gone to a Scottish Games?
Tell us about your current release: Book #4 in my Paradox Lake Sweet Romance Series, Trusting Love released today. If you’ve read my earlier Paradox Lake books, Trusting Love is grown-up Autumn’s story.
For all intents and purposes, they’re complete opposites.
Midwife Autumn Hazard catches babies and offers her mothers the option of home births. Ob/GYN Dr. Jonathan Hanlon delivers his patients’ babies only at a hospital or other medical facility with the most advanced equipment available. She loves the small-town birthing center where she practices. To him, the center is simply a steppingstone to something bigger. Family is everything to her. He keeps his distance from his.
Complete opposites. Except, that is, when it comes to love.
Welcome to Paradox Lake
Any fan of sweet romance will love the stories of small-town love in the Paradox Lake Sweet Romance series. Grab your tea or coffee, settle into your favorite chair, and be swept away into the cozy Adirondack town where complex characters navigate challenging situations as they find their way to love. Whether it’s love at first blush, old flames reuniting, or second chance romance, you’ll find pure reading enjoyment and satisfy your craving for sweet, wholesome romance.
Part of an ongoing series full of familiar faces, each story will stand on its own. With novel and novella lengths available, there’s something for everyone. Paradox Lake is written by USA Today Bestselling sweet romance author, Jean Gordon, who’s penned stories for the No Brides Clubs Series, Indigo Bay Series, and Harlequin Love Inspired, as well as for multiple sweet romance collections.
What’s the first major news headline that you can remember and what do you remember? This is going to date me. John F. Kennedy’s assassination. We were in my elementary school’s auditorium for some school-wide program and someone from the office came in and whispered the news to our teacher, who broke out in tears.
Who was your first Screen/Musical Crush? I’ve never been a big movie/music star person. When all my childhood friends wanted to be movie stars, I wanted to be a paleontologist. But Kris Kristofferson caught my fancy looks and music-wise at one time.
What is your personal, most effective way to get past writer’s block? I have three things I do when I feel stuck: (1) Just write any “garbage” that comes to me. I can always be revised. And I generally find it isn’t as bad as I thought. (2) Take a walk, even if it’s just around the inside of our house. (3) Take a bath.
Do you have pre-determined length in mind when you first begin a book? I like to have a pre-determined length, which is one of the reasons I like writing for multi-author series. The length is all set before I start, so I can plot to have enough going on to carry a story to that length. Or I can discover that the idea isn’t substantial enough to be a full-length book or too substantial to cover in a novella.
Who were some of your favorite authors as a child? When I was small, I fell in love with The Littlest Angel, which my mother read to us. Next it was The Secret Garden. And, of course, The Four Marys, which piqued my interest in Mary Queen of Scots and Scottish history.
Which of your characters most reflects your personality? I can’t really pinpoint what one character most reflects my personality, but all my heroines have a large part of me in them.
What is one thing that you “never saw yourself doing” and either do it now or have done? I have two things. Starting a book without having the “black moment” and the ending in my mind first. I’m doing that currently for the first time with my almost finished Falling for the Scotsman, which will release this spring as part of the multi-author Hopeless Romantics of Willow Ridge series. The second one is writing scenes out of order. I didn’t do that until after my 20th book.
Do you remember where you were or what you were doing when you started this story? I would have been at home in my office when I started writing. I got the story idea when my daughter had unexpected complications with a home birth that couldn’t have been foreseen. The couple declined to go to the hospital when she said it was necessary to. When they agree to be taken, it was too late, and the baby didn’t make. It shook her so much that she switched to clinic work with pre- and post-natal mothers only for a while.
Find Jean online:
Website = https://www.JeanCGordon.com
Facebook = https://facebook.com/jeancgordon.author
Goodreads = https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/395675.Jean_C_Gordon
Blog = https://www.sweetromancereads.com (Jean blots on the 7th of each month)
Jean is giving away an ebook copy of Trusting Love and a $5 gift card to one winner, and an ebook copy of Trusting Love to another winner! Check below to see all of the ways you can enter to win! Also, if you want a free copy of Trusting His Kiss, sign up for her newsletter at this link.
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Great interview! As someone who has used a midwife for 7 pregnancies and 6 homebirths (one pregnancy unexpectedly ended in a hospital), this story appeals to me. I’ll be checking it out!
My aunt took me to the Scottish Games in Pleasanton when I was 14. I will never. Ever. Forget that. Absolutely incredible! The thing that I remember most was on the last day, all the bag pipers assembled on the racetrack–filling the straight stretch–and played Amazing Grace.
Seven kids. Bless you. And thanks for checking out Trusting Love.
This was a fun interview! And your story sounds good. I always enjoy an opposites-attract kind of story. 🙂
Thanks. It — the blog and the book — were fun to write.
What an amazing life! I hope you go to Scotland next year and post a LOT of pictures you FB page! My hubby HATES to fly so I will probably never go so I have to live and experience through others. Also my memory is going and I am in awe of things that you can remember like favorite author as a child! I can just recall it was about a horse with a blaze. Also thank you for sharing your gift for story-telling. Such a great talent to have. It lets us escape for a few hours.
You can be sure I’ll post pictures when we do Scotland. Thanks for the comments.
Love this idea for a book. It would be interesting to see how she handles the two lines of thought. I’m currently pregnant with my third and a strong advocate for the midwife and natural way of doing things (if it’s safe for mom and babe of course).
Thank you for the giveaway