Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt
- Judith D Collins
- 6 days ago
- 8 min read
By: Ben Reeves
Narrator: Mike Frankland
ISBN: 9781668216361
Publisher: Avid Reader Press
Simon & Schuster
Publication Date: 07/07/2026
Format: Other
My Rating: 5 Stars (ARC)
TOP BOOKS OF 2026
"One of the most original, riveting, and moving books I’ve read in a long while." —Graeme Simsion, New York Times bestselling author of The Rosie Project
For fans of Fredrik Backman and Virginia Evans, an unforgettable and exquisitely moving novel about finding beauty, hope, and meaning in the brevity of life, as narrated by the one who knows it best: Death.
Travis is Death in the modern world. He wears jeans and a T-shirt and lives in a small, grey town. His job is to offer people comfort in their final hours of life. He’s stoic, gentle, and a little naive, despite everything he knows. He’s young and handsome, despite who he is. Each death he witnesses is meaningful to him; he listens, never judges, and most importantly, never tries to change anyone’s fate. He knows that every life must eventually end to maintain the balance of the universe and he respects the cycle.
Then he meets Dalia, a midwife, and her boisterous eight-year-old daughter Layla, who live across the hall. As Dalia and Layla come to embrace Travis, it becomes more difficult to maintain the detachment that’s allowed him to function for so long. Their time together teaches him what’s truly important in life—and what might be irrevocably lost in death.
Written with radiant warmth, wisdom, and compassion, Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt is a timeless story about appreciating life, accepting its end, and finding our place in the universe—especially when it feels most impossible—that will resonate with anyone who has ever loved and lost or worried at time’s passing.
My Review
Ben Reeves crafts a beautiful, intentional irony by pairing Travis’s identity as Death with his day job and his relationship with Dalia. Together, these two elements form the emotional heart of Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt.
Meet Travis: The Grim Reaper Next Door
The Hook
What if death weren’t a terrifying monster, but a lonely guy in a gray t-shirt who just wants to make your final moments feel safe?
Elevator Pitch
Travis is the human embodiment of Death, living a quiet life in a small town with his cat and escorting souls to the afterlife with gentle compassion. He has spent millennia maintaining strict emotional detachment from humanity—until he befriends his vibrant neighbors, a single mother and her two young daughters. As he gets drawn into their warm, messy world, his centuries of isolation crumble, forcing him to confront the agonizing beauty of life and the inevitable grief of loving people you are destined to lose.
Setting
A quiet, perpetually overcast, and unassuming small town that feels suspended in time, perfectly mirroring the gray, stagnant existence of its main character.
Vibe
🍂 Bittersweet autumn afternoons.
☕ Soft rain on a windowpane.
🐈 The quiet comfort of a purring cat.
🕯️ A gentle, melancholic hug for a grieving heart.
Genre
Magical Realism / Contemporary Speculative Fiction / Literary Fiction.
Themes
~The Universality of Grief: How loss connects us all rather than isolating us.
~The Beauty in the Ordinary: Finding profound meaning in mundane, everyday human routines.
~The Cost of Connection: Accepting that to love deeply means opening oneself up to eventual pain.
Standout Characters
~Travis (Death): An incredibly endearing, stoic, yet deeply empathetic protagonist who treats his heavy burden with ultimate gentleness.
~Dalia: The resilient, sharp-witted single mother and midwife whose fierce love for her children acts as the catalyst for Travis's emotional awakening.
Travis doesn't cause death:
He simply shows up at the exact moment a person’s time is up. He provides comfort: He sits with people, holds their hands, strokes their hair, listens to their final regrets without judgment, and guides them peacefully into the afterlife. He has a "human" day job: To blend into the modern world, he actually works as a photo restorer.
Author Writing Standout
Ben Reeves shines brightest in his exquisite, vignette-style storytelling. He masterfully intersperses the main narrative with brief, poetic glimpses into the lives of the random strangers Travis collects, turning minor characters into unforgettable, heartbreaking portraits of humanity.
Takeaway
Grief is not the opposite of love; it is the ultimate proof that we loved someone deeply, and that love makes the pain of mortality entirely worth it.
Title Significance
In "Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt," the title serves as a direct mirror to the book’s core theme: finding deep comfort, gentleness, and peace in the face of death.
Death as a Comforter
The story is narrated by Travis, who is the literal personification of Death. However, he is not a terrifying Grim Reaper with a scythe. He is a gentle, unassuming young man wearing jeans and a T-shirt.
Travis's sole job is to sit with people in their final moments. He listens to their final regrets, holds their hands, or makes them a cup of tea. The title represents Travis's ultimate mission: ensuring that when the final moment comes, the pain of life fades away, leaving only beauty and peace.
The Symbolism of Travis's Day Job: Photo RestorerTo blend into his small English town, Travis works as a photo restorer. This job is a direct metaphor for his cosmic role and how he interacts with human memory:
Metaphor
Travis’ strict rules of non-interference represent the walls we build around ourselves to avoid getting hurt, showing that living a life completely shielded from pain is not truly living at all.
Why You Should Read
Read this if you need a book that validates your deepest existential fears while simultaneously wrapping you in a blanket of profound peace and comfort. A Poetic Meditation on Why We Exist.
My Thoughts
"Why This Tear-Jerker Will Actually Make You Celebrate Life"
The pairing of Death & a Midwife creates a stunning contrast:
~A Contrast to Life's Difficulties
The phrase and title create a powerful juxtaposition between the harsh realities of living and the stillness of dying. Real life is messy, painful, and filled with grief—especially as Travis navigates his attachment to a midwife named Dalia and her young daughter. The title acts as a promise or a sanctuary. It suggests that death is not a punishment, but a quiet space where "nothing hurts" anymore
Character Roles in the Universe:
~Dalia, the midwife, ushers new human life into the world, holding hands through the pain of birth.
~Travis, Death, ushers human life out of the world, holding hands through the stillness of dying.
Two Sides of the Same Coin
Both Travis and Dalia are caretakers of the ultimate thresholds of human existence. They both sit with people during their most vulnerable, painful, and transformative moments.
The Ultimate Shift: Because Dalia works with the absolute beginning of life, she teaches Travis what makes life so vibrant and worth living in the first place. Seeing her bring life into the world is what finally shatters his emotional detachment. It forces him to realize exactly how much a human being loses when their time across the hall is up. Through Dalia and his day job, Travis stops just looking back at the end of stories, and finally tries to participate in one.
This book completely wrecked me in the best possible way. Because this is true literary fiction, the pacing is intentionally slow and meditative, prioritizing linguistic beauty and internal character shifts over plot momentum. The lyrical prose reads like a series of essays on mortality. Watching an immortal force of nature learn how to navigate simple human concepts like friendship, guilt, and affection is deeply moving. It is a quiet, heavy book, but it leaves you looking at the world with a bit more gratitude.
"A cozy, heartbreaking story about Death getting too attached to the living."
Verdict🏆 5 / 5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐Stars
"A quiet masterpiece of modern magical realism that will leave you weeping but strangely comforted." The most life-affirming book about dying you will read.
Recs or Read-Alikes
~The Midnight Library by Matt Haig (for the speculative exploration of life and regrets).
~A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman (for the grumpy/isolated protagonist softened by unexpected neighbors).
~The Story of Arthur Truluv by Elizabeth Berg (for the bittersweet, life-affirming look at loneliness, small-town connections, and the beauty in everyday life).
~Olive Kitteridge or Tell Me Everything by Elizabeth Strout (for the quiet, masterful observation of human flaws, profound grief, and interconnected community vignettes).
~Under the Whispering Door by TJ Klune (for a similarly cozy, gentle exploration of grief and the afterlife).
Others:
~The Next Thing You Know by Jessica Strawser.
~Lost Lake and Other Birds by Sarah Addison Allen
~The Top of the World by Ethan Joella.
When comparing Ben Reeves' novel to The Correspondent by Virginia Evans, both novels feature a central, devastating grief that anchors the slow-burning narrative. Both Evans and Reeves take a deeply melancholic, quiet premise, strip away all the usual plot gimmicks, and deliver a character-driven masterclass on human frailty.
~The Power of Epistolary Novels: In books like The Correspondent, the absence of a traditional narrator forces you to read between the lines.
~The Impact of Vignettes: In a novel like "Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt," vignettes prevent a heavy topic like death from becoming stagnant. Instead of dragging you through a linear, depressing plot, the short, standalone glimpses into different people's final moments keep the perspective fresh. Each small story acts as a mini-mirror reflecting the broader themes of the book.
Special thanks to Avid Reader Press and NetGalley for graciously sharing an advanced reading copy in exchange for my honest thoughts. I can't wait to listen to the audiobook narrated by Mike Frankland. I highly recommend. Top Books of 2026!
@JudithDCollins | #JDCMustReadBooks
Pub Date July 7, 2026
My Rating: 5 Stars +
Top Books of 2026
Praise
"Be prepared to reflect on what makes a well-lived life and to shed some tears before sending a copy to a friend. A good suggestion for fans of Matt Haig, Gabrielle Zevin, or Marcus Zusak."
—Booklist, starred review
“This is one of the most affecting, original, and unforgettable novels I have ever read. Through the lens of death himself, we confront the highs and lows of the human experience in a way that reminds us how gritty and exquisite it is to live. Ben Reeves has expertly crafted a mortality tale that is both abstract and specific, spiritual and physical, fantastical and as true as it gets. The characters are so vivid that they seem to be sitting beside you, their loves and losses your own. Absolutely breathtaking, with a perfect twist of an ending.”
—Sarah Damoff, bestselling author of The Bright Years
“This novel has all the ingredients of unforgettability: a plot you’ve never seen, characters you want to love, writing that glimmers on the page, and a spectacular ending that will smack you in the face with an aching joy. Days later, I’m still brimming.”
—Monica Wood, bestselling author of How to Read a Book
“Reeves repeatedly takes us to life’s most terrifying knife-edge, heartening us with the steady poetry of everyday life. This clever and vivid book made me fall in love with our collective ephemerality. I literally said, “Wow,” about halfway through. The ending left me speechless.”
—Matthew Quick, New York Times bestselling author of The Silver Linings Playbook and Dad, Love, Me
"One of the most original, riveting and moving books I’ve read in a long while."
—Graeme Simsion, New York Times bestselling author of The Rosie Project
About the Author
Ben Reeves lives in Peterborough, UK, with his wife and two children. An early draft of Everything Was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt won the international 2024 Bath Novel Award. When he’s not writing, he paints, makes music, and works as a web designer for a book printing company. WEBSITE
