You Do Not Have to Be Good: A Memoir

(Paperback)

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Description

When Dayna MacCulloch was two years old, her father killed his friend and then himself. Twenty years later, she went back to see where it happenedwhere her father morphed from the hippie, homesteading, jack-of-all-trades man that everyone loved to the guy who took his rifle off the shelf one night and shot his friend in the face. Standing in the place where he did it, a wildfire of unanswered questionsthe ones shed suppressed all her lifeblazed open within her. The life she was living no longer made sense, no longer was enough. While most of her friends were applying for big jobs, getting married, and getting pregnant, she bought a one-way ticket to a Greek islanddetermined to, as Rilke advised, live the questions for as long as she could.

You Do Not Have to Be Good is the story of where that choice led her: to five different countries over the course of five years. It is a candid, intimate memoir about the ways that loss and landscape guide and shape us, the ways strangers can heal us, and what it means to finally come home.

Reviews

The poignant exploration of a life broken open by tragedy, MacCulloch takes readers on a vulnerable journey across cultures to find a defining sense of self. Written with visceral, breathtaking prose,You Do Not Have To Be Goodcarries usbody and soulinto the heart of MacCullohs impassioned search for meaning, and, ultimately, love. A riveting account of loss, sex, conflict, and beauty that is impossible to put down.

Laura Whitfield, author ofUntethered: Faith, Failure, and Finding Solid Ground

A dazzling, reverent memoir, You Do Not Have to Be Good is about living fully in ones body and ones history. MacCulloch renders in gorgeous prose her journey across Europe, as she strives to understand her fathers death and her own wild heart. Through grief and desire, she leads us ever closer to the sublime.

Megan Kruse, author of Call Me Home

Author Bio

Dayna MacCulloch is a Somatic Wellness Coach based near Brighton, UK and Olympia, Washington You can find out more about her work through her website, WaterStoriestheBody.com, or follow her on IG @waterstoriesthebody.