EVERY THING YOU ARE by Kerry Anne King

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Everything You Are is both a heartwarming and heartbreaking story that is an enjoyable read.  It is about a cello, a magical cello that tears a family apart and ultimately, brings it back together. It is well-written and includes important themes like addiction and suicide plus forgiveness, love, redemption, family, and hope.

Braden Healey is an accomplished cellist who, after an unfortunate accident, can no longer make music. He is convinced he is cursed. Divorced from his wife and kept from his children, he has succumbed to a life of alcoholism and has given up all hope. But after his ex-wife and son are killed in a tragic car accident, he is left with no choice but to return in order to raise his 17 year old daughter Allie and protect her from the curse.

Even though he is an alcoholic, Braden has other redeeming characteristics that makes him a sympathetic character. He is trying to make amends with his daughter but she rejects his efforts at every turn. While desperate to remain sober, he feels pulled to drink again and again. Braden is a broken person forced into a situation that will cause him to rise to the role of Father despite setbacks along the way or fail miserably and lose his daughter.

<i>Braden does the math, the number of days from Monday to Thursday divided by the distance between him and the drink he just poured, multiplied by the enormity of his failure and loss. All the calculations come out to the same answer: he is a miserable excuse for a human being.</i>

<i>Braden needs a wall to lean on. He needs to be nicely inebriated, lubricated, sloshed, to protect him from his daughter’s venom and the overpowering presence of the cello. He needs it so bad he can taste the wine in his mouth, warming his throat, creating a shield between him and his emotions.</i>

At the urging of a friend Braden joins what appears to be a novel approach to deal with alcoholism, in contrast to AA (Alcoholics Anonymous). It is called Adventure Angels and is a different kind of support group. Instead of what is considered to be AA’s themes of guilt, shame and powerlessness, Adventure Angels treat each day like an adventure and try to bring a positive experience to someone else, perhaps through an altruistic act. If the member suffers a setback, they inform the group who then decides on an adventure for them. Some might say this approach reinforces their bad behavior but Adventure Angels consider it a celebration of an individual’s return to sobriety.

The cello plays a predominant role in the story.  This musical instrument is the one thing that Braden and Allie have in common. He paid for music lessons so that she could learn to play the cello, but like her father, she has given it. Braden and Allie hear it playing music at times and also feel a magnetic pull toward it. The magical realism element adds another layer and for me, greatly enhanced the story. But the power of music truly has the power to heal.

<i>In all of the years since he walked away from his music, his home, and his family, the cello has followed him into his dreams, inhabited all of his waking moments. A phrase of music here, a sensation of strings beneath his fingers there, a phantom bow in his hand when he’s drowning his memories in a bar.</i>

   

<i>Maybe he and Allie still have a chance. Maybe they can connect over the music. If he could teach her, it would be almost like playing himself.</i>

Thank you to Lake Union Publishing and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for my honest opinion.