From the author of "Life Times Nine", "The Guest House Chronicles", "Falling Hard in Hollywood", "Eight Founding Queens" -- Using a process of blending facts and fiction to create a tale leaves the challenge of separating reality from imagination. Some events are true to life. Certain characters did or do exist. The result is an often stranger than fiction outline of the adversities of everyday life.Creative efforts were often minimal due to those from the author's past who didn't need a fictional spin. Tragedies of familiar lives filled the pages with sorrowed truths. Obstacles and outcomes are, at times, formed from visionary tales. Can you spot which is which? Throughout our lives, it is the influence of many that help to bring us direction and to experience opportunity or defeat. Opportunity in the form of what life hands us and defeat by one's refusal to find a path to perseverance. The choice is ours to make. If and how we choose starts with some of our earliest influences of good and bad.For one teacher, students and colleagues are an eclectic and diverse collection of paths crossed. They were his proteges of potential on which a teacher would make his mark. Each year brought new challenges in the form of troubled and tragic souls. Some became leaders in their fields while others struggled to survive life's cruelty.From the demise of a torturous trio to the nerd who conquered the world of technology. From the transgender girl who became a surgeon to the flight attendant who perished during a tragic event. Follow the child of extreme poverty who found unexpected fortune and the rich kid who fell prey to early alcoholism caused by neglect. Adding to a colorful journey are fellow teachers who brought their own unique stories. The singer who lost out on stardom because of a political assassination. The wounded soldier in need of surgical reconstruction. The criminologist who transitions into an educator only to solve a mystery that was hiding in plain sight. Facts are hidden among the fiction. The overlap will leave you curious. These stories and more bring perseverance to some and defeat to others.