and you learn how to live

What would you do if released from death row after twenty-five years? 

Follow Lucy Davis as she conquers her demons and delusions and learns how to live.

How does Lucy's bleeding-heart land her back in a federal prison?

Lucy has spent twenty-two years on death row. On the night of her execution, her aunt produces a letter from Lucy’s deceased mother who confesses knowledge of Lucy’s childhood trauma and abuse. The letter persuades the president to give Lucy a pardon and her story shifts from psychosis, murder intrigue, and courtroom drama to Lucy living a purposeful life and helping others who suffer from their own past traumas. Lucy rejects the psychological and social labels that stigmatize individuals and she encourages women on death row to realize their own self-worth and identity.

Lucy’s niece Jewel Anne and Jewel's wife Beverly help Lucy adapt to modern technology. Jewel is the illegitimate child of Lucy’s sister Tracy who rejects Jewel for her sexual orientation and Lucy for her past crimes and mental instability. Even after a TV appearance on a psychologist’s talk show, Lucy and Jewel cannot reconcile with Tracy.

With Beverly, Jewel, and six cats, Lucy travels the country in an RV to promote her two memoirs and visit women on death row. In Texas, she agrees to take a woman to Miami naïvely believing that the woman is escaping from her abuser when she is actually carrying hidden drugs. During another road trip to LA, the Feds jail Lucy for transporting a drug mule across state lines. 

While in federal custody, Lucy starts corresponding with a man on San Quentin’s death row. Marvis le Tron survives his ordeal by practicing Buddhist visualization. He and Lucy share the same philosophy and fall in love but Covid hits before they can marry. After a year of quarantine, Marvis and Lucy have a prison wedding. From behind a Plexiglass panel in the visitation room, Marvis takes Lucy on a visualized honeymoon reminiscent of the Buddhist Pure Land. 

The story is not about any religion. It’s about possessing a calm mind free from the mental conditionings and agitations society imposes on the individual, especially those who chose to be different, are different, or have landed on death row. Although Lucy had a terrible start in life and her PTSD led to a mental collapse and subsequent death sentence, the world hasn’t stopped her song and Lucy’s heartfelt story has an optimistic ending.

Jewel Anne is the illegitimate child of Lucy's estranged sister. Beverly is Jewel's wife. During the funeral of Lucy's aunt, Lucy meets Jewel and Beverly and invites them to help her adjust to a world that has dramatically changed since Lucy first went to prison. Jewel, Bev, and Lucy become a close-knit family and travel the US together to visit women on death row and to promote Lucy's two books about her life on death row and about how she's surviving life as an ex-con. 

Lucy begins a correspondence with San Quentin death row inmate Marvis le Tron. They share the same philosophy about life and fall in love. Lucy visits Marvis several times until Covid keeps them apart for over a year. 

Letter from San Quentin death row inmate Marvis le Tron:

You see, dear cousin, most people don’t know the time of their deaths. But I do, or I will. In fact, I’ll know the precise moment the world decides I must die. But when that time comes, I won’t be afraid. At the last moment of my life I’m prepared to chant the name of Amitabha Buddha and he will arrive at my gurney, along with Mahasthamaprata, Manjushri, Samantabhadra, Guan Yin, Maitreya and other great beings. Glorious light will fill the entire death chamber and no one will see this but me. Amitabha will carry me to his paradise where I will emerge from the pools of purity in a blue lotus. 

I will be reborn in this land as a mid-level being because for several years I’ve been practicing the dharma and sending warm hearted thoughts to all those who harm or despise me. I have repented for my crimes and bad karma. It won't take me long to enter the final dharma door to liberation or return to this world to offer my awakened heart to those suffering from delusions about themselves and this world. I have no doubt about this. I have no doubt about Amitabha and his pure land paradise.

When the warden asks if I have any final words, I will say the name of Amitabha ten times and recite this prayer,

Homage to Shakyamuni Buddha

Homage to all great Buddhas and Bodhisattvas

In the ten directions of Maha Vairocana

Homage to Amitabha Buddha

May all sentient beings receive the peace, happiness, and wisdom of a pure, clear mind and may there be an end to all suffering.

Eternal love from your cousin, 

Marvis Le Tron