The Story Behind The Road to Redemption by D.M. Davis

By D.M. Davis

I’ve been asked many times how I came up with the idea of The Road to Redemption, and in truth, it came to me in a dream. Not so much book one, but the Finding Grace series as a whole. Theo and Lauren were fully developed characters in my dream. It’s as if they were talking to me while I slept, telling me their story. The concept of two people (a race of humans), who were born with predestined mates, their bond so strong, if one died the other would die too. The kicker is they don’t know who their mate is. It’s chance, life choices, the universe at large that brings them together. Only if they find each other can they then ‘activate’ their gifts by their physical and emotional bond. They can only acquire and pass on their gifts if they have children with their predestined mate. In Theo and Lauren’s case, they don’t know anything about THE GIFT, who they are, or that they were made for each other. Book one, The Road to Redemption, in the Finding Grace series is only the beginning of their journey. The depth of their gifts and who Theo and Lauren really are is yet to be discovered. Though the paranormal aspects grow as the series progresses, at its heart it’s a love story, a second chance, redemption from their pasts.

I should probably mention at this point, The Road to Redemption was the first book I ever wrote. Waking up from the above dream, I said to myself I’m going to write a book. No, I hadn’t written anything worth noting prior to this. Yet I wasn’t daunted by the task, nor did I tell anyone what I was doing. I worked on the outline, spent the next few weeks writing whenever I could, wherever I could, on my computer or my iPad. The book just poured out of me. Somewhere in those early weeks I mustered up the courage to tell my husband and kids what I was doing. I thought for sure they would laugh at me. Imagine my surprise when they were nothing but supportive! Slowly, I started to tell the rest of my family and a few close friends. But it was still my secret project. I devoting my evenings and weekends to the task. It took me three and a half months to finish it at a whopping 380,000 words. Most romance novels are closer to 60,000-100,000 words. I had a Stephen King/Diana Gabaldon size book here. What was I going to do with it? How was I going to get it published?

Well, I didn’t publish it. I continued to write the next two books in the series. The story kept coming, the characters demanding their time on the page, each book amassing 380K+ words. They were huge, the size of nearly four normal-sized books each. Until finally I decided I needed to get something out the door. I needed to publish. But these were my babies. I didn’t want to self-publish and mess them up. So, I wrote a new book I thought would be a standalone. I ended up writing and publishing the first three books in my Until You series.

Now, over four years later, I rewrote The Road to Redemption. Split it into two books (The Road to Redemption and The Price of Atonement), the first of which went live on Jul 26. It’s still Theo and Lauren’s story, just fine-tuned and shorter than the original four-book length, though it is my largest published book to date.

What is it about? Remember my dream? It’s that but more, much, much more.

When Life put them together, the Universe noticed. What they didn’t know is that they were made for each other. Literally.

Theo
My ex broke me, or so I thought. I’d shut down, given up. But my past doesn’t seem so bleak when the woman I’ve only seen in my dreams walks into my usual coffee shop, jump-starting my heart and giving my soul a desperately needed punch to the gut.

She’s damaged goods. But not in the way you’re thinking.
Life broke her.
…And I’m here to kiss it and make it all better.

She’s my queen. My redemption. My second chance at forever.

Lauren
He’s gorgeous beyond words. Why he’s attracted to me when no one else is, is unfathomable. And yet, he is.
He’s Mount Everest, and my climbing legs are broken.
…I’m broken. Always have been. Always will be.

I’m drawn to him like the universe demands it. He accepts it as truth. I know better, and when he figures it out, I’ll be decimated.

I want redemption, but it’s a painful road to travel. I’ll have to face my demons.
…And apparently, he wants to fight them with me.

All journeys have a beginning. This is Theo and Lauren’s…

D.M. Davis is the author of the new book The Road to Redemption.

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