Arnel C Leyva / Arnel Castro Leyva
'My final mugshot is on the book cover. Now, no one can use it to shame me. I own it.' - Arnel Castro LeyvaWhat happens when a tech executive trades corporate meetings for meth-fueled street survival?Arnel Castro Leyva built a globe-trotting career working for Microsoft, T-Mobile, Adobe, Yahoo, and a handful of startups. But his life was perpetually on the verge of ruin because his real job was a professional drug addict.In the shadows of the Pacific Northwest, Arnel loses everything and his double life collapses into a mid-life crisis of pandemic proportions. He descends into the lawless streets of the COVID lockdown and enters The Life: drug dealing, financial scams, grand theft auto, living with prostitutes, and organized retail theft. Along the way, he meets a cast of kindred spirits-narcissistic, codependent people-pleasers hell bent on exploiting the system, each other, and themselves.With prison looming, Arnel is given a chance at redemption through a strict yet therapeutic criminal justice program. He finds the startup idea of his life-helping other formerly incarcerated people with substance use disorders to create a life worth living-and realizes he was on the path to answer his calling all along.A brutally honest memoir-equal parts Leaving Las Vegas, Trainspotting, Breakfast at Sally’s, and Breaking Bad-ultimately redeemed by a Brené Brown / Gabor Maté / 12-Step moral to the story.
