The Traveler

Taking the road less traveled makes all the difference. 


“When you go home, Denis, stay with who you are now. If people like it, they will be with you. If they don’t, and you try to please them, you will be miserable.” 


Halfway through his year traveling the world, former Silicon Valley highflier Denis Hickey is forced to face his past and his potential futures. As a backpacker in his late forties, and unafraid to try anything, Denis has unforgettable encounters with everyone he meets. Crossing Turkey, India, Thailand, Vietnam, Bali, and Australia, he comes face to face with spirituality and religion, sex and love, poverty and death—from helping shoot a ­documentary on Bangkok prostitutes to chatting alone with Mother Theresa in Calcutta. 

Yet even as he unfolds a more open and less controlling personality, his family and friends from his old life join him on his adventures and challenge his newfound freedom and worldview. In The Traveler, the second book of the Breaking Free series, Denis confronts his life and choices with honesty, humor and insight. His personal journey to break free from the rigid roles imposed on us—to find love and new ways of living—will find an echo in everyone’s life. 


"Breaking Free is a story of courage and love, of happiness and failure, of confusion and clarity, and of regret and completion…. This is a story of us! A wonderful life adventure!" —Frank Zolfo, fellow traveler