Once Upon a Time in Dollywood

A playwright must grapple with her difficult year and writer’s block while falling for the single dad living next door in this emotional debut novel from Ashley Jordan.

Eve Ambroise may be a rising star playwright, but her personal life is falling part. Desperate for a fresh start, she breaks up with her fiancé, cuts off her parents, and heads to the Tennessee mountains. But keeping up the lie that she’s just on a writing retreat becomes near impossible when faced with the well-meaning townspeople and a neighbor who has just as much baggage as she has.

Coming off a contentious custody battle, Jamie Gallagher is restructuring what his life looks like as a single dad, and spending more days at his cabin makes his new ＂free time＂ a little less empty. Especially when he meets the beautiful--and prickly--woman next door. The last thing he needs is a new romance to shake up his family dynamics even more, but there’s something about Eve.

What starts out as a fling quickly becomes more serious, and it’s not long before Eve is running scared once again. She’s loved and lost in every possible way, and risking it one more time could finally break her. But like the fireflies that fill the mountains around them, Jamie’s and Eve’s lives keep falling into sync. A fairy-tale ending could be in the cards, but only if the new couple can get out of their heads and put their hearts first.

Ashley Jordan (she/her) is a millennial from Atlanta, by way of Brooklyn, with a degree in Psychology and great affection for narratives that explore the full humanity of women. Raised by a group of phenomenal Black women, it was in watching them navigate the world that she became most interested in their lives. Her upbringing, along with the inimitable experience of attending Spelman College, has only further shaped her belief in the power of Black women’s stories. Ashley has had a love of writing since penning her first short story in second grade, and in 2023, she became a Reese’s Book Club LitUp Fellow.