The Epic Story of Every Living Thing

*Kirkus Best Book of the Year

*BookPage Best Book of the Year,

*Booklist Best Book of the Year

*Amazon Best YA Book of the Year Editor’s Pick

*Chicago Public Library Best Teen Fiction of the Year

“Seventeen-year-old Harper lives under pressure to academically achieve, continuously engage her Instagram followers, and think about her future, all of which worsens her anxiety—which is already at an all-time high because of the pandemic. She has always wondered about her anonymous sperm donor father and how his DNA may influence her. A chance online comment leads her to half sibling Dario, and, as they become closer, they connect with two others who share half their DNA: Simone and Wyatt. The four eventually find their biological father, and they embark on a summer trip of self-discovery. Harper, who is nursing a broken heart after a breakup, is both excited and terrified about what will become of her after this experience. This gorgeous coming-of-age novel thoughtfully examines questions of identity, family, kindness, and a longing for connection. Framed by Harper’s narrative voice, presented in what is often a whirlwind of nonstop thoughts, the story also deftly and empathetically engages head-on with anxiety. Each chapter begins with excerpts from 19th-century letters and journal entries whose relevance becomes clear as the novel progresses, adding an extra, significant layer to an already rich narrative. Most characters are White; Simone has a dark-skinned Israeli and French mother, and the cast is diverse in sexual orientation.

An epic tale of life, love, and identity. (Fiction. 14-18)”

— KIRKUS (starred review)

“Seventeen-year-old Harper Proulx is practiced at internet sleuthing, taking Instagram selfies that make her look adventurous and approachable, and interacting with her steadily growing social media following. She’s not so good at being present in the world without her phone, which she uses to help allay her fears surrounding Covid, distract herself from her mother’s perfectionism, and idly search for her sperm donor father. When someone who inexplicably looks just like Harper contacts her via Instagram, she learns that she has three half siblings: Dario, Simone, and Wyatt, all conceived from the same sperm donor as Harper. Together, the teens become embroiled in an epic pursuit for their biological father that leads them to Hawaii. Excerpts from 19th-century letters, journals, and newspapers included at the beginning of each present-day chapter detail a seafaring expedition whose inclusion—and subsequent narrative convergence—is both mysterious and enthralling. It’s impossible not to cheer for Harper’s sincere voice as she comes into her own, working to overcome her fears, manage her anxieties, and stop hiding in plain sight. Caletti’s (One Great Lie) bighearted novel, which endorses the wonders of being present in the world rather than existing exclusively online, uses two seemingly perpendicular voyages to expertly navigate themes of belonging, connection, family, and identity.”

— Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“In the midst of the pandemic, Harper Proulx’s life revolves around her boyfriend Ezra, what ifs, photo filters, and the calm reassurance she receives from likes and comments on Instagram. One day she gets a comment: “you look just like my friend, Dario.” This isn’t the first time it’s happened. She keeps a journal filled with notes on these people and what she knows about MF—her Maybe Father. She reaches out to Dario, who, like her has auburn hair and blue eyes, and the two meet up. They exchange notes and he tells her about the others. Up until this point she’s only used social media to appear as though she’s taking risks, but an unexpected break up with Ezra leads her to start taking real ones. Stepping outside of her comfort zone and into a world of unanswered questions, Harper goes on a trip with Dario and some of her half-siblings to Maui where her biological, sperm-donor father is apparently living. Through this novel about overcoming fear and expectations, Caletti examines what makes a person—is it their DNA, their lived experiences, or the family who raised them? She takes a critical look at the role and impact of technology and social media on the mental health of teens and shows what can be gained by stepping away and being present. Harper’s relatable thoughts and anxieties mirror that of many teens before and during the pandemic, with and without similar family structures. VERDICT Reminiscent of Natasha Friend’s The Other F-Word and Robin Benway’s Far From the Tree. Highly recommended.”–Alicia Kalan

— School Library Journal (starred review)

“Seventeen-year-old Harper Proulx lives her life on Instagram. Her lattes and lunches, her enviable day trips, even (if she’s being honest) her artsy boyfriend—they’re all curated for maximum appeal to her growing list of followers, whose validation she craves.

When one of those followers leaves a comment about Harper’s resemblance to a person named Dario, Harper is momentarily taken aback but not entirely surprised. Since she was young, Harper has known that she was conceived through a sperm donation, and she soon connects with her doppelganger and confirms that they are, in fact, half siblings. But Harper is stunned when Dario tells her that they have at least 40 more half siblings out there in the world—and that their sperm donor appears to be a beach bum named Beau Zane.

Reeling from a breakup and on something of a whim, Harper decides to join Dario and two other half siblings on a summer trip to Hawaii to meet Beau. She’s nervous about the idea, but at least the photos of Hawaii will look stunning on her Instagram, right? But nothing could prepare Harper for what she discovers on her trip, including a new understanding of identity and family, and a renewed appreciation for the world itself.

Deb Caletti (A Heart in a Body in the World) is far from the first YA author to tackle the hazards of a life lived online and the potential toll on teen mental health and relationships. But Caletti’s sophisticated, intricate storytelling brings complexity and richness to The Epic Story of Every Living Thing as the award-winning author explores themes of anxiety, found family and the natural world. Even the novel’s love story plays out in remarkable fashion, with subtlety and insight.

Caletti takes readers on a voyage that unfolds gradually and mirrors Harper’s own journey of discovery as she learns to witness “the whole of it, the grand tapestry.” The Epic Story of Every Living Thing is both deeply introspective and profoundly engaged with the world, making for a novel that embraces imperfection and inspires empathy.”

— Bookpage (starred review)

“Printz Honor Book winner Caletti (A Heart in a Body in the World, 2018) introduces readers to only-child Harper, the product of a sperm donation. Riddled with anxiety that's grown worse since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Harper finds a sense of control as a social media influencer. But her life is thrown into chaos when, through a boy named Dario, she discovers a link to the man who made her mother’s pregnancy possible. As she comes to discover that she has dozens of siblings, Harper and some of her newfound family embark on a journey to meet the man who helped create them. Each chapter, introduced by a journal entry or letter by real-life nineteenth-century ship commander Mary Ann Brown Patten, brings Harper closer to finding her courage in this heartwarming and authentic story that's packed with a collage of well-researched detail, people, and themes that heighten the book’s realism. Alongside Harper’s coming-of-age story, the book offers a refreshing turn on the romantic subplot and a complex mother-daughter relationship. The only thing notably missing is acknowledgment of the real-world impacts caused by tourism, colonialism, and other forces that the Indigenous people of Hawai’i have brought to light (often through social media). Otherwise, this will find itself right at home in collections with strong contemporary YA, alongside serious but uplifting realistic novels in the vein of Maureen Johnson and Katie Cotugno.” — Abby Hargreaves

— Booklist (starred review)

“Without knowing the identity of the man who was her sperm donor, seventeen-year-old Harper feels that “half of her is a blank.” Then she meets Dario, her half-brother, and learns that there are forty-two half-siblings…and that they’ve located the man himself. So Harper, Dario, and two other half-siblings travel to Hawaii to meet Beau Zane, where, to Harper’s relief, Beau and his mother welcome them. Beau teaches them how to dive, his passion, which quickly becomes Harper’s passion too, and when their beloved diving spot is threatened, Harper and her new family feel compelled to try to preserve it. Caletti (One Great Lie, rev. 9/21) captures our collective anxieties (the story is set in the second year of the COVID-19 pandemic) as well as the constant intrusion of electronic devices, especially the numbing, manufactured perfection of social-media “squares.” The natural world is offered as the antidote: when Harper sees a jellyfish on her first dive, she is “so there, so present in this profound moment, that if you reminded her again that she once felt empty, she’d hardly believe it.” The summer is full of similar moments of wonder, in which Harper feels connected to Beau, her newfound siblings, history, and “every living being”—including herself. A rich, contemplative story about looking beneath the (literal and figurative) surface to find love, purpose, and joy.” RACHEL L. KERNS

— The Horn Book

From the award-winning author of Honey, Baby, Sweetheart comes a gorgeous and fiercely feminist young adult novel. When a teen travels to Hawaii to track down her sperm donor father, she discovers the truth about him, about the sunken shipwreck that’s become his obsession, and most of all about herself.

Harper Proulx has lived her whole life with unanswered questions about her anonymous sperm donor father. She’s convinced that without knowing him, she can’t know herself. When a chance Instagram post connects Harper to a half sibling, that connection yields many more and ultimately leads Harper to uncover her father’s identity.

So, fresh from a painful breakup and still reeling with anxiety that reached a lifetime high during the pandemic, Harper joins her newfound half siblings on a voyage to Hawaii to face their father. The events of that summer, and the man they discover—a charismatic deep-sea diver obsessed with solving the mystery of a fragile sunken shipwreck—will force Harper to face some even bigger questions: Who is she? Is she her DNA, her experiences, her successes, her failures? Is she the things she loves—or the things she hates? Who she is in dark times? Who she might become after them?

“The world, and Harper in the world: this is the problem. The world is too big - it spits tornadoes and unleashes hurricanes, and it holds viruses that, in a matter of days, can wreck life as you know it. That’s hard to forget. And Harper is too small...”

Neptune’s Car, Mary, and Me

If you know me through my books or in my real life, you know I have a thing about the water. I’m not sure where it originally came from. My great uncle, who was a large figure in my growing up, was a merchant seaman, and my dad was in the Coast Guard, and coming from the San Francisco Bay Area and then later moving to Seattle may have contributed. Water feels like it’s in my DNA. I see the waters of Lake Washington right outside my windows, and I want to be in water, on water, or near water as much as I possibly can. When I looked through some photos for this essay, I realized a good two-thirds of mine, from childhood on, include a swimming pool, a lake, or an ocean.

As my readers also know, this love creeps into my books, too, nearly every one. One Great Lie takes place on an island in the waters surrounding Venice, and Essential Maps for the Lost features Lake Union in Seattle. Stay, and other novels, take place on fictional islands in the San Juans, in Washington State. I must have passed along that particular water-loving DNA to my children, too, because my son, Nick, is a nautical engineer and a sailor, and my daughter, Sam, is game to hop aboard any boat whenever possible. A huge bunch of my best family memories of us take place near water.

Oh, those great fun sunset sails on Obsession and Neptune’s Car, with thanks to Nick and Seattle Sailing.

I first became aware of Mary Patten’s story when my son was a sailboat captain for Sailing Seattle, which offers excursions and charters on their two seventy-foot yachts, Obsession and Neptune’s Car. On many weekends, Nick would also be racing on Neptune’s Car, and, as often as we could, we would hop on, as well, for an incredible sunset sail. During that time, I wondered about that curious name – Neptune’s Car – and its origins. What I read astounded me. I knew that sometime I would have to write about Mary, a young wife, a teenager, who not only became the first female to command a ship after her husband fell ill, she did it while eight months pregnant, after facing down a mutiny. She navigated and led the clipper ship, Neptune’s Car, its cargo and her crew around Cape Horn during horrendous gales, handled a violent and traitorous first mate and an incapable second mate, and brought her ship into the San Francisco Bay in second place in the race they were in.

That, my friends, is a girl who did what she had to do.

And, wait, did I mention that this took place in 1856? When there was a nationwide yellow fever epidemic, just before 1857, one of the greatest flu pandemics of all time?

You’d look serious, too, if you had to deal with a mutiny. (Photo: National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian)

Before I began The Epic Story of Every Living Thing, I was thinking a lot about doing what you have to do, hanging in there and coping and managing under difficult circumstances, because… Our pandemic. Mary had no idea what would be asked of her, and we had no idea what would be asked of us. But during that time, I took comfort in hearing stories about what people endured in the past. When I was tired and cranky and done with quarantine and uncertainties and fear, such stories put our own circumstances into much needed perspective. Mary fought a storm so brutal, that she wore the same clothes for fifty-two days. I fought boredom and irritation and, admittedly, wore the same sweatpants for several days in a row. Perspective. It was time to write Mary’s story, but not just Mary’s story. Harper’s story, too, and our story - one of unprecedented events in an unprecedented time.

While Mary’s unasked for adventure did not end with a missing ship in Molokini Crater, and while the journal entries are fictional, the events that Mary endured in the book are all true. What was going to happen at Molokini Crater: true as well. And what is also true, as you most likely know, as you most likely feel, are many of the things that Harper must struggle and reckon with that Mary never did – a near-constant message that we are in danger, set right beside the messages that we are helpless against it. Messages, of perfect people leading perfect lives, while ours… Isn’t. Messages that cause a riptide of anxiety and impossible expectations.

It’s a different kind a brutal storm. But make no mistake – both can pull you under. Both can wreck.

Firework Jellyfish (Photo: National Geographic)

The Epic Story of Every Living Thing is a story within a story: Mary’s within Harper’s, and Harper’s within Mary’s. As difficult as Mary’s life was, and as trying and confusing as Harper’s is, The Epic Story of Every Living Thing is, above all, a book about hope, wonder, and the human spirit. It’s about love, and the ways we show up for each other. And it’s about one of the best ways I know how to get through hard things - by remembering that we are all a story within a story: a human being with all of her or his frailties and power and beauty and possibilities, alive in a natural world with all its frailties and powers and beauty and possibilities.

L. to R.: *The legend of the bridal chamber at Florida’s Silver Springs as seen through glass bottom boats*, undated; “The author studying fish, four fathoms under the sea”, *Nonsuch Land of Water*, 1932; *Dahlak, with the Italian National Underwater Expedition in the Red Sea,*1957

“The world, the real one, the one outside those squares? The messy, scary, unpredictable and hard one; the natural world, with its frightening power and powerful beauty; the human world, with its horrific wrongs and its moments of shining rightness, it’s worth it. The risk is worth it. The squares are nothing in comparison. Nothing.”