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Fantastically Unsuccessful: Winning by Losing
Paperback
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: Jun 5 2026
Pages: 92
Weight: 0.22
Height: 0.22 Width: 5.00 Depth: 8.00
Language: English
Jezz Ellis has failed his A-levels spectacularly, been divorced, never earned a single England cap, and built an entire career by accident. By most scoreboards, he hasn't quite made it. By his own? He's done more than enough.
Fantastically Unsuccessful is a plain-spoken memoir from a fairly ordinary lad from the Wirral who has spent a lifetime flitting between success and failure - often in the same week. It's about the rugby career that ended on a physio's table and the business built from sweeping salon floors. The brother lost too young, and the grief that somehow pushed him forward. The dad who accidentally became a national cycling champion by just keeping going. The divorce that led, eventually, to the best relationship of his life.
It's about the people who never get the trophy but make everything work. The quiet wins nobody claps for. The ordinary Tuesday where character actually lives.
And it's about one word that doesn't get nearly enough credit.
Enough.
Not more. Not maximum. Not someone else's definition of winning. Just enough - the right amount, for the life you've actually got.
Part memoir, part quiet argument, Fantastically Unsuccessful will make you look again at what you've already built, rethink the ruler you've been using, and feel considerably better about the messy, ordinary, brilliant life you're already living.
For anyone who has ever felt like they nearly made it. For anyone who suspects they might already be there.
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