About the Author

R. MB. Pearson

Me and Peejay, our peachfront conure. Yes, he talks.

I first started writing this novel back in 1998. At least, that’s the date on the earliest draft I could find—buried in an old WordPerfect file, no less! Yes, WordPerfect. That’s how long this story has been with me. Thankfully, I managed to convert those ancient files into Word documents, or they might’ve been lost forever.

The story began when I finally had the chance to work on my writing full-time. But as I set out on this path, I realized I had so much to learn. I wanted to sharpen my craft and, if I’m honest, find a quicker route to getting published. I thought publishing short stories or poetry might help build my resume as a writer—especially since I was transitioning from a long career as an insurance and risk management executive into a completely new world.

So, I took a leap. I enrolled at Bucks County Community College to pursue an AA degree in Journalism. It turned out to be one of the best decisions I ever made. Those years not only honed my skills but gave me invaluable experiences, like getting my stories published during my internship at the Bucks County Courier Times. It was there I learned how to see the world through the eyes of a reporter.

From there, my writing career grew. I became a writer for NYU’s School of Continuing and Professional Studies, crafting business documents like speeches and white papers. But there was a downside: professional writing, with all its structure and formality, began to stifle my creative side. The muse that had first inspired this novel started to fade, and the story languished, unfinished, for years.

It wasn’t until I retired—many years later—that I finally returned to it. Honestly, I wasn’t sure I could finish it. I had reached a narrative impasse long ago, and the story seemed destined to remain incomplete. But then, I found myself devouring all ten books of Outlander, and suddenly, inspiration struck. I dusted off the manuscript (then titled Learning to Fall), renamed it Bound by Destiny, and—at long last—finished it.

Circa 2000. This was my home office 72 Lions Drive, Bucks County, PA. I had a PC with a tower for the CPU. It had a 3.5 and 5.25 floppy disk drives, and CD-ROM drive. My printer was a 1989 HP DeskJet, the first generation of inkjet printers. This picture was taken with a film camera and then I scanned the print and digitized it with the scanner tucked in the corner.

So much of this novel is inspired by the twists and turns of my own life: the two months I spent as a student at the University of New Hampshire, my time as a rookie reporter at the Courier Times, and my stint as an assistant to an advertising executive at an agency specializing in pharma ads. These experiences shaped the world I created and the characters who live in it.

Yes, there are deeply personal moments in this story, too. Like my characters, I’ve known great loss. I lived through the heartbreak of spousal suicide while raising two young children on my own. But I never wanted my story—or theirs—to dwell in that darkness. Life is heavy enough, and my goal was to weave humor, resilience, and even a touch of magic into the pages. I wanted this book to leave readers with a sense of hope, even in the face of life’s hardest challenges—and to believe in a little magic.

My passion for writing runs deep in my blood. My father, a journalist for the Manila Times, was one of my earliest inspirations. Some of my fondest childhood memories are of him as a broadcast news reporter. I’ll never forget the moment he helped me with a high school literature assignment. I’d been tasked with revising the ending of a short story, and I asked him to take a look. It must have sparked something in him because he told me about a short story he’d written, one that ended on a cliffhanger. I was so inspired by his creativity that I rewrote my homework with my own cliffhanger ending.

When I read it aloud to the class, I received a standing ovation. It was then I knew: I was meant to be a writer.

It’s been a long and winding journey, but every twist and turn has led me to this moment. Writing Bound by Destiny has been a labor of love—a project born from years of learning, growing, and rediscovering my voice. I hope it brings readers the same sense of wonder and connection that it’s brought me.