Everything was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt

'This book will change your life' Joanna Cannon, Sunday Times-bestselling author of Three Things About Elsie
Travis lives an unassuming life with his cat in a small English town. Travis also happens to be the cosmic force of Death, visiting people in their final days and hours of life, before shepherding them into whatever happens next. He doesn't judge them, doesn't feel emotion at their passing, and never tries to change anyone's fate... until he meets a young, single midwife called Dalia and her boisterous eight-year-old daughter, Layla. As he gets closer to this small, seemingly unremarkable family, Travis begins to learn what it is that makes life so worth living, and so what it is that is irrevocably lost in death.
Full of compassion and deep magic, Everything was Beautiful and Nothing Hurt might be a novel about Death, but it's also about the joy of being alive - because only through knowing that all things must end can we truly appreciate all the things that we already have, from the people around us to the strange wonder of our spinning world.

Ben Reeves lives in Peterborough with his wife and two children, and he won the Bath Novel Award 2024 for this novel. When he's not writing, he paints, makes music, and works as a web designer for a book printing company.