Erica Baccus is a Los Angeles Tribune Critically Acclaimed Best Selling Author of A Promise Kept, and a speaker advocate for making empowering life decisions. Her first literary debut, A Promise Kept: Honoring His Wishes, Embracing My Own, explores how one keeps a promise to a person who they loved the most who is slipping away. Released on September 30, 2025 to critical acclaim, hitting three Amazon best seller lists in the US and Canada, A Promise Kept is sparking conversations around the world.
A Promise Kept is a 41-year love story with her late husband, John Baccus, and the devastating choice they made, together, when John asked Erica to help him end his life following an Alzheimer’s diagnosis.
When Erica met John Baccus, it was destiny wrapped in laughter, globe-trotting, and decades of quiet devotion. She was the effervescent adventurer; he, the steady heartbeat who never said no. Together, they lived a full, rich life, until Alzheimer’s came knocking.
But even in the shadow of decline, John had one last request. A bold one. A heartbreaking one: Help me go while I still remember I love you.
Already drawing early praise for its emotional depth and bold vulnerability, A Promise Kept was declared as a Critically Acclaimed Best Seller by The Los Angeles Tribune.
A Promise Kept is meditation on love in its most expansive form: the kind that dances across continents, survives time, and says yes even when everything inside you wants to say no.
A Marriage Built on Love and the Power of Yes
From the instant Erica crossed paths with John Baccus, their connection felt like destiny, spontaneous, magnetic, and meant to last. She was spirited and insatiably curious about the world; he was her calm in every storm, a man whose quiet steadiness allowed her to soar. Together, for four decades, they built a life overflowing with adventure and affection, decades of travel, laughter, family, and the kind of everyday intimacy that turns two lives into one shared rhythm.
But as A Promise Kept reveals, love isn’t always measured in years, it’s measured in courage. When Alzheimer’s began to steal John’s memories, he made one final, heartbreaking request: to leave this world while he could still remember the life, and the woman, he loved.
And in an act of devotion as brave as it was tender, Erica said yes.
A Memoir That Dares to Go Where Many Stay Silent
With unflinching honesty and a grace that’s been hard-won, Erica invites readers into the most intimate chapter of her life, the slow, painful goodbye to the man she loved. She walks us through the unraveling of memory, the moral complexity of medically assisted death, and the quiet, extraordinary bravery it takes to hold someone’s hand as they choose their final moment.
A Promise Kept doesn’t shy away from the difficult questions. Instead, it walks right into them, where love collides with mortality, where autonomy meets heartache, where saying goodbye becomes the final act of devotion. It’s not just a story about death. It’s a powerful meditation on what it means to live fully, right up until the end.
A Different Ending: One Woman’s Journey Through Love and Letting Go
At a time when the subject of assisted death continues to ignite debate around the world, A Promise Kept doesn’t aim to persuade, it simply bears witness. Erica shares one deeply personal story: of a marriage built on love, of promises made and kept, of two hearts bound by the courage to choose dignity over decline.
Readers have called the memoir “beautiful and deeply moving,” describing it as an emotional experience that lingers long after the final page.
As conversations about end-of-life choice, autonomy, and compassion evolve, Erica’s voice enters the dialogue with rare humanity and grace. Her story doesn’t claim to hold all the answers, but it reminds us that love, in its truest form, honors freedom even at the edge of goodbye.
About the Author Erica Baccus
Erica Baccus began her writing journey not as a lifelong author, but as a grieving wife compelled to speak the truth of love, loss, and autonomy. After the death of her husband, John, she turned to the page instinctively, writing daily for nearly a year. What began as a private act of healing became a powerful memoir that now invites others into one of life’s most difficult, and most human, conversations: how we die.
A Promise Kept is Erica’s first published work of creative nonfiction. Written with unflinching honesty and deep compassion, her memoir reflects a lived experience few speak of openly: what it means to help a loved one die on their own terms when dementia steals both memory and control. Her reflections have sparked conversations across communities, drawing interest from grief counselors, caregivers, and policy advocates alike. Following her husband’s death, she became an informal resource for families navigating similar paths, often referred by medical professionals to offer insight, comfort, and advocacy.
Before her work as a writer and speaker, Erica built a respected career in qualitative market research. In 1996, she founded her own consulting firm, which served global clients including HP, Nvidia, Dell, Microsoft, and Nokia. She retired in 2011 after selling the company to her employees—a legacy she remains proud of for the careers it nurtured and the ideas it helped shape.
Today, Erica continues to speak openly about end-of-life autonomy, the limitations of “Right to Die” laws in the U.S., and the emotional complexities that come with choosing dignity over decline. She believes storytelling is a form of service—and that honest stories like hers can help light the way for others.
When she isn’t writing or speaking, Erica enjoys skiing, golfing, traveling, and capturing the world through the lens of her camera.
A Promise Kept: Honoring His Wishes, Embracing My Own Details
Title: A Promise Kept: Honoring His Wishes, Embracing My Own
Author: Erica Baccus
Publisher: Soul Sparks Press Publishing
Publication Date: September 30, 2025
Format: Paperback, eBook
ISBN: B0FP6XR44V
Available at: Amazon and wherever books are sold
