Award-winning author David W. Berner’s stories linger like wood smoke on a cold night. This memoir weaves tales of broken bonds, of need and longing, of glimmering memory and buried regrets, all with clear-eyed affection and recognition that to be human is to shoulder on despite what we’ve lost. Enjoy!

Any Road Will Take You There: A journey of fathers and sons
David W. Berner
4.8 Stars (33 Reviews)
Genre: Travel | Biographies & Memoirs

In the best tradition of the great American memoir, “Any Road Will Take You There” is honest, unflinching, and tender. A middle-age father takes the reader on a five-thousand-mile road trip, the one he always wished he’d taken as a young man. Recently divorced and uncertain of the future, he rereads the iconic road story – Jack Kerouac’s “On the Road” – and along with his two sons and his best friend, heads for the highway to rekindle his spirit. However, a family secret turns the cross-country journey into an unexpected examination of his role as a father, and compels him to look to the past and the fathers who came before him to find contentment and clarity, and celebrate the struggles and triumphs of being a dad.

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After Opium: Stories
David W. Berner
4.8 Stars (4 Reviews)
Genre: Short Stories

The ten stories in this collection are taught, smart, and wide open windows into deep corners of the human condition. David W. Berner, award-winning author of the memoir ACCIDENTAL LESSONS, has a skill for telling short-short fiction. In this group of stories – some previously published- Berner explores how we carry on after kicking habits, shedding obsessions, or losing what we believe we can’t live without.

In the title story – AFTER OPIUM – boyhood friends meet years after one has overcome the spell of opium addiction. THREE DRUNKS AND TWO COPS explores how even the best of intentions can be dangerously, and even humorously, ill-advised. BOBBY AND KATHLEEN and LOVING LINDA touch on desperate relationships that despite the best intentions never have a chance to survive. THE BIRD, PIECES OF GLASS, and OVER THE EDGE AND INTO THE WIND examine the fragility of love. Berner looks at how we bond in the midst of possible tragedy in TWO MEN ON A ROOF and the lasting sadness and horrific experiences of a Vietnam War veteran are revealed in THE SMELL OF DEAD SOLDIERS. And lastly, we are reminded of the melancholy beauty and precious memories of a first love in the collection’s final piece, BARRE WORK.

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Accidental Lessons – A Memoir of a Rookie Teacher and a Life Renewed
David W. Berner
4.8 Stars (25 Reviews)
Genre: Arts & Photography | Biographies & Memoirs | Drama & Plays | Politics & Social Sciences | Self-Help

Accidental Lessons is a remarkable memoir by successful Chicago journalist David W. Berner. Berner takes the reader inside his own personal journey; a heart wrenching and inspirational account of self-discovery.

Berner had it all–a very successful career as a broadcast journalist and a wonderful family life. But his career hits a bump and he finds himself out of work. Life then delivers more trouble–his father becomes terminally ill and his marriage falls apart. In the middle of painful personal times, this respected journalist makes a decision that changes his life forever.

Berner takes a job in a public school outside Chicago where the students are representations of society’s “throw-aways.” What he learns from them teaches him invaluable lessons about himself, who he is, and why he became a journalist in the first place–to seek out the truth and give voice to those who need their story told.

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