Where are they going?

Away from the life they chose to live, or to one of the infinite lives they could have lived?

Raymond, Asian, Shelly, and all the other characters in the Unlived Lives Trilogy experience their alternative lives.

You can, too.

​Imagine where you would be today had you made better choices in the past.

Learn from that; it's never too late to begin again.

Those who could have been in your life but weren't because you or they made different choices are, or could still be, living their lives. 

But what about those you never met?

You changed classes in school. You took a different job. You didn't go to the park on the weekend as you had planned.

Who did you not meet because of those decisions, some of which you may now regret?

Don't!

​That's in the past, focus on what you do from this day forward. 

Selecting what we dream isn't an option; something within us decides that for us.

However, we can try to understand what the dream meant. There usually is a reason.

Raymond was compelled to examine a day in his life that changed all that was to follow. 

You have such days too, don't dismiss them. 

I'm no fashionista, but it's not like I'm unaware that what I'm wearing is out of date. I'm just waiting for it to come back.

Baggy pants, including jeans, are once again 'boss' (look it up, every generation after Boomers). So, too are my 55-year-old Purcells. So boss they never weren't!

Which brings me to (you knew it would) the lives, both lived and unlived, in which I wore and would have worn these jeans and sneakers had I made different choices.

"Everything old is new again?"

I'm not, but a lot of my clothes are, and I'm diggin' it.

A year ago, last October, I announced the availability of the second book in the Unlived Lives trilogy, The Unlived Lives of Shelly Bennett. 

Today, I'm pleased to announce the third and final book, The Unlived Lives Reckoning, available now on Amazon as an ebook with print and audio to follow. 

And for those of you who prefer an alternative distribution source, watch for Reckoning here in a month or so. 

Note to my good friend, Ek Jones: I just received ACX authorization for JT to start narration (JT Farrell Voice Acting and Narration). That takes more time, given his schedule and the two or three weeks it takes ACX to publish when he's done. Hang in there, I'll post when it's up.

To all who bought and read/listened to one or both books, thank you. As the man said, what a long, strange trip it's been. 

​Will there be more? You'll have to read/listen to Reckoning to find out. 😉

​#psychologicalthriller, #fictionbooks, #multiverse, #paralleluniverse

A byproduct of writing the Unlived Lives trilogy is that I am now more likely to dream of lives I would have lived had I made different choices in the past. Some of them I enjoy, some I don't.

The life I do live is no different. Starts and stops, good and bad, and, like Raymond and the others, I have to accept what comes along.

But more than just accepting, I identify the choices I would make again, those I would not, hoping to have more of the former, less of the latter in the future.

There are no do-overs, but we can do better.

That's me, recently out of the army, 1970, sitting on my older brother's lap, clowning for the camera. Takes me back to the '50s, to that backyard where I fought many WWII battles with my friends. All of us, sons of WWII veterans.

What should have been long gone by the time this pic was taken was that clothesline. A relic from the '50's when mom and dad could afford a used washing machine, but not a dryer. Every weekend, Mom would have that clothesline filled with loads of wet clothes drying in the sun.

I would come in the back door to the house, finding Mom sitting at her mangle, ironing bed sheets on a machine like this one, a hand-me-down from her parents. 

I would squeeze by her and the mangle, the fresh smell of those sheets filling the air, on my way to the kitchen counter for two or three (four maybe?) of mom's fresh-baked, made-from-scratch, still-warm peanut butter cookies.

​Finally, in the early '60's, the mangle was gone, and in its place was a new washer, this time with a matching dryer. 

The clothesline? I wouldn't be surprised to find it still there.

​That's one unlived life I was fortunate to have lived.

#paralleluniverse, #multiverse, #psychologicalthriller, #fictionbooks

How boring would life be if everything turned out as planned?

You wake up every morning knowing what will happen, what won't.

By the end of the day, you know what did and didn't, do you ever think about what might have been?

I have dreams of places similar to the one in this video.

So real, occasionally uncomfortable, I have to wake myself and try to put them aside.

Where do such thoughts come from if not our past or possibly our future?

I placed the Unlived characters where I have been. Have I done so where I will one day be?   

Who you would choose requires you imagine all those who would have been in your life had you made different choices.

​You have an infinite number of people from which to choose.

The Unlived Lives Reckoning, the third and final book in the Unlived trilogy, is with Paula for production. (We're getting close EK Jones.)

As soon as Paula says we have what we will publish, I will send the final manuscript to JT Farrell for audiobook narration.

JT did a great job on both Raymond and Shelly, and I'm sure he will again on Reckoning. No easy task given the need to correctly pronounce foreign language dialog, Vietnamese, in particular.

​Some of you are asking, "What's next?" That question is answered at the end of Reckoning. No peaking, finish the book first.

#multiverse #paralleluniverses #psychologicalthriller #fictionbooks.