After tragedy upended the contours of her life, Lauren Kessler, an unflinching immersion journalist, felt compelled to move—to do something, to be somewhere else. So she set out alone on the famed Camino de Santiago, walking across Spain to create space between the life she’d lived and the life she hadn’t chosen but now inhabited.
Raw and luminous, Everything Changes Everything is a story about facing what we’d rather avoid, about the wounds we carry, hide, and—sometimes—heal. It’s about the privilege of choosing hardship, the grace of temporary friendship, the solace of kindred spirits, and the power of movement to unstick what’s stuck. It’s also about unfounded optimism, unlikely laughter, and the way grief and beauty can coexist in a single step.
Love, Loss, and a Really Long Walk, A Memoir
NOW AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER
Near Portland? Join Lauren on February 24 at Powell’s bookstore for a talk with fellow author, Renee Denfeld. Learn More.
Below, Lauren receives her first copies.
Published by The Hatchette Book Group
Order from Hatchette
The Reviews are In…
“In Kessler’s journey on the Camino she learns that sometimes you have to lose yourself to find yourself, especially when you’re facing an unexpected and uncertain future. It is a beautiful book about love, loss, the weight that grief can impose on you—and most importantly, how to unburden yourself.”
— Marisa Renee Lee, award-winning and bestselling author of Grief Is Love: Living with Loss
“Everything Changes Everything is a gift to anyone who has ever woken up in a life they don’t recognize anymore. It’s about finding the momentum to keep moving one step, and then the next. Thank you, Lauren Kessler, for finding the words.”
— Janine Urbaniak Reid, author of The Opposite of Certainty
“Lauren Kessler has transformed unimaginable tragedy into something profound and exquisitely rendered—a story about enduring love, told with heartbreak and humanity in equal measure. To be immersed in Everything Changes Everything is extraordinary.”
— Becky Ellis, author of Little Avalanches
“Lovely, aching, and heartbreakingly real, Everything Changes Everything traces the story of a life broken—and then revealed—by addiction and loss. Lauren Kessler takes us on her own private journey, and in the process teaches us about our own.”
— Rene Denfeld, bestselling author of The Child Finder
