Michael Alan Peck recently won the Illinois Library Association's 2015 Soon to be Famous Illinois Author Contest for his contemporary fantasy novel The Journeyman. The Journeyman is the first book in The Commons series. It was published in January 2015 and is available for sale on Amazon.

In The Journeyman, three unlikely heroes board a doomed bus. Destination: the afterlife. Their mission: to save forever. But first they have to save themselves.

Synopsis:

“Paul Reid died in the snow at seventeen. The day of his death, he told a lie—and for the rest of his life, he wondered if that was what killed him.”

And so begins the battle for the afterlife, known as The Commons. It’s been taken over by a corporate raider who uses the energy of its souls to maintain his brutal control. The result is an imaginary landscape of a broken America—stuck in time and overrun by the heroes, monsters, dreams, and nightmares of the imprisoned dead.

Three people board a bus to nowhere: a New York street kid, an Iraq War veteran, and her five-year-old special-needs son. After a horrific accident, they are the last, best hope for The Commons to free itself. Along for the ride are a shotgun-toting goth girl, a six-foot-six mummy, a mute Shaolin monk with anger-management issues, and the only guide left to lead them.

Three Journeys: separate but joined. One mission: to save forever.

But first they have to save themselves.