The Second Virtue

Three people; three predicaments; one solution. Telli Trujillo survives a horrifying bank robbery but is haunted by the experience. What does he need to prevail over his fears? Joy Juneau is a plucky thirty-year-old boss's concubine trapped in a rut of cynicism. What does she need to reconnect with the hopeful young woman she once was? Donald Duffy is a high school senior stripped of self-confidence by his overbearing mother. What does he need to mature into a self-assured adult? The answer is courage - the second virtue. Searching for the daring to become themselves weaves these characters into a braid of uplifting, funny exploits, including the Sherlock-Holmesian unraveling of a stubborn crime puzzle, a boy propelling himself to freedom by stealing his mother’s car to take a girl she despises to the prom, and the best sex scene ever involving a woman with casts on both legs. The Second Virtue explores the dimensions of the search for inner resolve and rediscovers in a fresh, perceptive voice the universal truth Charlie Chaplin once observed: "Life can be wonderful if you're not afraid of it.”