Blog Tour w/ Guest Post & Giveaway: Accepting the Fall by Meg Harding

Posted April 24, 2018 by Dale

Confronting the past is never easy.

Cole Whitaker is happy. He has the job and boyfriend he always wanted. His heart’s in no danger of being broken, and he can’t ask for more from life. As a kindergarten teacher, he sees it all; however, one troublesome student has him reaching out to the parent, wanting to help. There’s something about Savanah that tugs at his heartstrings.

He never expected her father.

Zander Brooks hasn’t had an easy life, and he’s made some mistakes. Freshly retired from the military and working as a firefighter, Zander thought he’d left Cole in the rearview mirror. He’s not expecting him to appear in St. Petersburg, Florida, of all places, teaching his daughter’s kindergarten class. Suddenly, his biggest mistake is being shoved in his face.
This is Zander’s chance to close a door he’d never fully shut, but time with his former flame might change his mind.

All buy links or pre-order links: http://amzn.to/2HrrgSX
Release Day: June 8th, 2017

Meg Harding’s take on Accepting the Fall:

Not everything is perfect, and it’s not always going to go right the first time around. It’s not any less special because it was flawed.

Writing Second Chance at Love

Second chance romances have always been a favorite of mine when it comes to reading. There’s something very… honest about them. People are inherently flawed, and let’s face it, not a whole lot goes right on the first try. I love the idea that there’s always hope, that given time maybe things will work out. I like that situations and people can be redeemed and closure can be found. Writing a second chance romance, however, is definitely more difficult than reading one.

It was important to me that Cole and Zander’s story included the elements I personally like to see in this particular trope: angst and, eventually, forgiveness. I wanted a separation that was heartbreaking but redeemable. I wanted to show that both men had grown and matured over time, and that while they were good for each other at the time, they were better for each other in the present.

I’ve always been a sucker for young adult romance, where angsty teens come together and create a safe place with one another. And when those books end, I give myself the “and they lived happily ever after” speech. I NEED a forever kind of happy ending, even if it’s only forever in my mind. But realistically? Very few people get a happily ever after, especially not as teenagers.

Accepting the Fall is a mix of all of this. Cole and Zander meet and fall in love as teenagers, real life does what it tends to do and in the process teenagers do what they tend to do—make mistakes they’ll eventually learn from, and life goes on. I wanted to write two men who loved each other even more because their time apart allowed them to become who they were really meant to be. And once they’d reached that point, well, I wanted to give them their happy ending.

Sometimes things are better the second time around.

What Cole had said while in the hospital was true—Zander was a good person when it came down to it. It might take him time, but Zander eventually came around to what was right. He’d never tolerated injustice, and he’d always tried his hardest. But he was a stubborn ass, and if he deemed something was in his way, it wasn’t going to be there for long.

Cole did not want to be the obstacle in Zander’s path again. One time was more than enough, thanks very much.

So, as Cole took the seat beside the bane of his existence, he tried not to think about the body heat Zander was generating. He told himself not to obsess over the way their legs were brushing through their jeans—unavoidable with the way Zander sprawled—and their shoulders knocked. Every minute shift of Zander’s body shouldn’t have pinged on Cole’s radar. The contact shouldn’t have left Cole holding his breath and reciting numeric tables in his head.

Zander’s presence created a tangible buzz under Cole’s skin, an awareness of the other man that was all consuming and completely absurd. Without consciously paying attention, Cole could tell anyone who asked that Zander had sighed twice since Cole had sat down, he’d scratched his stubbled jaw five times, licked his lips three, and he smelled like warm cinnamon and fresh detergent.

A glance at his phone showed Cole it had been a whole five minutes. Just eighty-five more to go.

Meg Harding is a sucker for things on four legs and works as a pet sitter when she’s not writing. She’s an editor and a lover of fanfiction. She enjoys the theatre, concerts, and lazing about in front of the TV. Meg Harding is a graduate of UCF and Anglia Ruskin, with a bachelors in Psych and a masters in publishing. For as long as she can remember, writing has always been her passion, but she had an inability to ever actually finish anything. She’s immensely happy that her inability has fled and looks forward to where her mind will take her next. She’s a sucker for happy endings, the beach, and superheroes. In her dream life she owns a wildlife conservation and is surrounded by puppies. She’s a film buff, voracious reader, and a massive geek.