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Overview
What would you do if you lost everything—your job, your home, and the love of your life—all at the same time? When it happens to Seattle ad executive Alan Christoffersen, he’s tempted by his darkest thoughts. Instead, he decides to take a walk. But not any ordinary walk. Taking with him only the barest of essentials, Alan leaves behind all that he’s known and heads for the farthest point on his map: Key West, Florida. The people he encounters along the way, and the lessons they share with him, will save his life—and inspire yours.
A life-changing journey, both physical and spiritual, The Walk is the first of an unforgettable bestselling series of books about one man’s search for hope.
Editorials
Kathy Lee Gifford
“Hoda and I both thoroughly enjoyed this book . . . The Walk is beautifully written.”New York Journal of Books
“Richard Paul Evans has proven to be one of America’s most precious gifts . . . an inspirational writer who has the ability to read our very souls and heal broken hearts. . . . His books are the ones you can’t wait to finish, but when you do, you wish you hadn’t. I suggest readers accompany Evans on The Walk.”Kirkus Reviews
From Evans (The Sunflower, 2005, etc.), the first installment of a new series starring a Seattle adman who loses everything and embarks on a soul-cleansing cross-country trek. Alan Christoffersen has it all-his own thriving boutique ad agency in Seattle, a McMansion, luxury cars and a beautiful wife, McKale, who's also his best friend from childhood. In mid-meeting-he's just snagged a lucrative new account-Alan is notified that McKale has been injured in a fall from her horse. His partner Kyle promises to run things while Alan tends to McKale during her hospitalization and rehab. On his first day back at work he learns that Kyle stole his clients, and the agency is now teetering on the brink. When McKale dies from complications from a urinary tract infection, fate piles on. Alan's finances are in turmoil. The bank forecloses on the house; the cars are repossessed. With about $20,000 left to his name, Alan decides to walk across the continental United States by the longest route-Seattle to Key West, Fla. Lessons are learned from people he encounters along the way: the waitress who's a survivor of childhood sexual abuse, the bed and breakfast proprietress who shares her near death experience, the stranded motorist who will literally become his "angel" when he fixes her flat tire. Alan's exodus should generate many sequels-this installment barely takes him through Washington State. The message is clear: Alan has been taken out of his comfort zone because the Almighty has loftier plans for him. Jane and Michael Stern meet Paulo Coelho.Publishers Weekly -
Taking a page from The Odyssey, bestseller Evans (The Christmas Box) launches a new series of inspirational novels with a serious misstep. In the novel's outset, once-successful Seattle advertising executive Alan Christoffersen loses everything important to him: his beloved wife dies after being thrown by a horse, his business partner steals all their clients for himself, and lenders re-possess Alan's home and cars. Anchorless, Alan decides to take a walk to "the furthest point reachable by foot," Key West, Fla., in search of new meaning. In short chapters, Evans covers the first 12 days of Alan's journey, taking him from Bellevue to Spokane, Washington; the journey is largely uneventful, filled in by details of Alan's meals at small-town diners and fast food joints. Lacking a sense of dynamics or immediacy, the first leg of Evans' epic is a contrived attempt at honest seeking.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.