Parallel Lives

"[A] searing melodrama … as characters lose loved ones, wallow in ill feelings, or suffer weighty guilt over their choices. Ferry also offers a gratifying and memorable finale. [A] worthwhile novel about the dangers of rancor and spite."

~Kirkus Reviews

In a split-second, Patrick was gone; that moment would haunt Alexander forever. "Parallel Lives" is an enthralling novel that tells the story of Alexander Eastgard and his best friend, Patrick Close. Alexander is an athlete and a scholar with an adventurous spirit and an intense fascination with the past. When Alexander's rival, Hector Gonzalez, causes Patrick's death, the tragedy torments Alexander for the rest of his life and sets in motion a chain of events that darkens the lives of those around him- Helen, a woman of great beauty and astonishingly poor judgment; Mark, her devoted son; Julia, the Harvard undergrad whose romance with Mark proves unexpectedly dangerous; and Giulietta, the prescient but lovelorn fortune-teller- across two generations. This is an unforgettable novel filled with compelling characters. It is the story of a passionate, illicit affair, the apprehension and imprisonment of a drug lord, the descent of his son into addiction, a suicide with no body, and a hidden gun that falls into the wrong hands.

Judith Ferry is a native of New Orleans, a graduate of New York University School of Medicine, and now a physician at Massachusetts General Hospital and Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School. She specializes in the diagnosis of lymphomas and leukemias. She resides in Boston's waterfront neighborhood. This is her first novel.