Author
Peter Schmotzer
UNPLANNED CONNECTIONS
For Book Clubs:
After losing his family in a tragic accident, Ron McQuillen has nothing left to live for. His final plan is simple—until a stranger steps into his path.
o
Mike Schwartz needs a favor. Just a short flight to a nearby airport. Desperate and guarded, he convinces Ron to help him—unaware that their chance meeting will alter both of their lives.o
​
Mike carries a burden of his own. His wife is dead, and his sister-in-law Naomi blames him. Consumed by grief and anger, she wants justice—no matter the cost.
o
As Ron and Mike cross cities and skies together, Ron’s attempts to detach only entangle him further. Strangers are helped. Small acts of kindness ripple outward. Yet each night, Ron’s wife appears in his dreams, and the pull toward vengeance grows stronger.
When new truths surface about his family’s accident, Ron faces a choice that will define him: pursue revenge, or allow unplanned connections to lead him toward forgiveness.
Some journeys change your destination. Others change your soul.
WADING THROUGH STATIC
Mike Schwartz had built a life that looked perfect from the outside — a beautiful wife, a Manhattan condo, a career on the rise, and a child on the way.
o
Then one violent afternoon reduces everything to silence.
​
Trapped in traffic while his mentally unstable brother spirals out of control, Mike listens helplessly as the unthinkable unfolds. By the time he arrives home, the life he knew is gone.
o
Grief sends him back to Canton, Ohio — back to streets he once couldn’t leave fast enough, back to memories he thought were buried. Waiting there is the woman he never truly let go of — the college girlfriend by whom he has measured every relationship since.
As he tries to rebuild, fragments of the past begin to surface. Conversations remembered differently. Decisions reconsidered. Motives reexamined. Slowly, he uncovers the truth about why she left him — a truth that forces him to confront the man he was and the illusions he’s carried for years.
Some losses shatter you.
Others reveal who you’ve been all along.
THE SHOEBOX LETTERS
(Temporary cover)
While Sherrie undergoes open-heart surgery, her adult children are led to a shoebox filled with old letters—letters that reveal the love story they never fully knew.
​
Through these intimate pages, the past unfolds in vivid flashbacks to World War II, tracing their parents’ emotional journey across continents and decades. Their father, Dan, had rarely spoken of his time in Europe, leaving his children unaware of the hardships he endured as a combat medic. They also discover Turn-table Tommy, a charming but poisonous radio DJ who pursued Sherrie after she ended her relationship with Dan—and who refused to accept rejection.
​
As the letters surface long-buried truths, Sherrie uncovers a secret she unknowingly shared with her former beau, a bond that once tore them apart. In the fragile space between memory and survival, she must confront whether the very thing that divided them could now offer a second chance.
​
Set against the backdrop of war and home-front longing, The Shoebox Letters is a story of love tested by distance, secrets, and time—where the fiercest battles are fought within the heart.