Alexis Brunet
Official Site of Rhymes Junkies
Life is nothing but a series of crossroads that continuously present us with one single existential question—where to next?
The Devil’s Crossroads in Clarksdale, Mississippi, is known as the location of blues legend Robert Leroy Johnson’s bargain with the Devil, where Johnson sacrificed his soul to become the greatest bluesman the world has ever known. For Alexis Brunet, the famed crossroads became the source of inspiration for this literary work—a series of reflections on the many intersections that paved the way to where he stands today.
As mortal hitchhikers, these character-defining, life-altering crossroads remind us that we are in a permanent state of flux. Change is the only constant. At each junction, our human virtues and their alter egos battle for our attention and feed on our emotions, influencing our decisions in an eternal spectacle for the Divine. These choices shape us into who we are becoming. No one knows what it all means, but attendance is mandatory.
Bio
About the Author
Alexis Brunet was born in Marseille, France. The first twenty years of his life were littered throughout France and Spain. At the age of twenty-one, he moved to the United States, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in business/statistics at the Florida Institute of Technology and an MBA at the University of Miami. He then started and sold two small businesses and began working on Wall Street when he turned thirty, more out of necessity than choice. Alexis developed a passion for surfing, skateboarding, and skiing early in life. He is a self-taught guitarist who enjoys playing the blues, husband to a lovely wife, and father to three wonderful children. He believes that everyone has a story to tell, regardless of status, and encourages all to share theirs as well.
In the Press
Brunet pens a thrumming debut memoir of his life as a series of decisive crossroads, those moments that “[determine] and [influence] our lives for years to come,” and likens his personal junctures to blues legend Robert Johnson selling his soul to the devil in exchange for musical genius.Brunet’s youthful stories are colorful and compelling, crafted with barely concealed tension and strain
BookLife Review
A travel logue that models voracious living. The Devil's Crossroads celebrates rich expriences and asserts that a personal and collective good comes from telling one's own story.
Clarion Book Review
The Devil’s Crossroads: Adventures and Musings Hitchhiking the Road of Life is a literary reflection/memoir of music, memories, life experience, and crossroads of change. It comes from a musician/surfer/husband/father who pinpoints many of the crossroads in his own life which forced him into unexpected directions, for better or for worse.
The lyrical pen of Alexis Brunet is evident from his opening lines:
The Devil is a cruelly brilliant architect. Calculated and practical, his brutish designs mock the holy curves of every gilded archway and treasure-adorned shrine that strains to elicit worship and inspire blind faith. If I have learned anything, it’s that the guilty go to church and the desperate bargain with this fallen draftsman.
If, by this opener, readers anticipate a blend of spiritual, philosophical, and psychological form of autobiography, they would not be far off. But, woven into this fabric of opportunities and experiences lies a sense of literary and social reflection that translate the seemingly mundane into bigger pictures and higher-level thought.
Take Brunet’s experience of researching blues music history and his approach of dovetailing this interest with the intersection of his own life. Call it a memoir or a musical piece, as you will, but the strength of this special blend lies in its ability to move from the Mississippi Delta’s blues origins to topics of family dysfunction and broader life experience.
Brunet moves through the world powered by his love of music and life. This sentiment is echoed by words that capture both as he engages in unexpected opportunities, from becoming a stock operator to the contrast between his origins as a homeless kid in Morocco to “wining and dining in some of the best restaurants in New York, sipping on five-hundred-dollar bottles of wine.”
From voluntarily assuming his parents’ mortgage payments when they retire without adequate planning to defining his own morals, values, and definitions of healthy versus unhealthy patterns of behavior (“I never thought any of this was unhealthy. I assumed it was my responsibility to provide for those who had failed or were unable to provide for themselves.”), The Devil’s Crossroads traverses constantly-shifting ground as Brunet navigates the influences of his past and the possibilities of creating a different future.
Libraries and readers interested in life journeys which lead to the development of gratitude, responsibility, revised values, and honesty and respect will welcome the opportunity, in The Devil’s Crossroads, of learning just how these life values develop and are influenced by interests, objectives, and change.
Many a book club will also find The Devil’s Crossroads the perfect choice for discussing life transitions as well as the influence of music and culture on these pivot points and choices.