Coming Soon!
Release Date: November, 2023
Only Love Lasts
a novel by Anthony Timiraos
Only Love Lasts is a work of fiction that highlights multi-generational, multi-cultural, and multi-family stories about love and disappointments. Six decades of life experiences beginning in the mid-1960s, just before two high school students, Randy Jensen and Stephen Porter, graduate from their respective schools 150 miles apart. They independently acknowledge their sexual orientation and move to attend different universities in the Boston area, where they meet at a private cocktail party hosted by a popular Boston gay couple, fall in love, and experience a healthy, active, open relationship. Their explicit anonymous sexual encounters during their college days and after graduation became the topic of conversations between each other and their friends. Randy and Stephen loved to share their detailed stories of random sex with strangers, and their friends loved to listen.
Unbeknownst to the two lovers, a forced sexual experience between a young female classmate and Randy Jensen shortly before high school graduation resulted in a pregnancy. Many years later, they were informed that Randy was the father of a baby girl, Alice, who was now close to 25 years old. They are faced with a difficult decision - reach out to Alice or ignore a father/daughter relationship.
Love, sex, drugs, death, incarceration, and happiness are just some of the experiences intertwined with multiple families in search of a better life. The story introduces us to the Sanchez family, who were forced into a dangerous and devastating border crossing in pursuit of safety and a home to raise a family. We also learned about Louise McCawley, an Irish immigrant who witnessed the loss of coworkers to the horrors of terrorism. Then there was Linda Peterson’s quest to return home with an old boyfriend, which cost them their lives, and later in the story, her girlfriend Sandra Brooks and her boyfriend were arrested and sentenced to ten years in prison for kidnapping and robbery. The lessons learned from love, mistakes, personal tragedies, and accomplishments define the characters in the story. Nobody is exempted.
A new generation surfaces with the love affair of two young gay men, Max Edwards, and Enrique Sanchez, who look to emulate the love, dedication, and open relationship Stephen and Randy shared during their lifetime. Everyone looks for solutions to life’s questions they hope to find in front of their eyes. Max and Enrique seek guidance from Randy and Stephen's experiences as they contemplate and observe the outside world. All of them are looking for a better life in the ever-changing landscape they see from their windows. Some realize that only love lasts beyond their lifetime.