Book Review: A Covers It All, Every Day

Every Day, by David Levithan, is a Young Adult novel about a person named A, who lives through other people. A is transferred into a random person’s body—and consequently that person’s life—each and every day. One day, A spends the day as a boy named Justin, a not-very-good boyfriend of a girl named Rhiannon. Unsurprisingly, A falls in love with her. They try to do everything they can to spend time together, which turns out to be difficult when A is living as other people in different places in different situations every day. A’s secret gets more difficult to keep when he leaves a nerdy boy in the dirt after sneaking to a party to see Rhiannon, leading to the boy getting in contact with websites about possible demon possessions.

A, the protagonist of Every Day, is a genuine person, born with the peculiar ability to live through others’ bodies. Each day, it’s someone new. At midnight, A switches to a new person, unrestricted by gender or sexuality or nationality or ethnicity—only by age. Despite not having a personal life, A lives to the fullest and is not bitter towards the predicament. Since it is only for a day, A respects people’s privacy and just gets through the day. Without a doubt, A is just an amazing person and protagonist, a lovesick, bodiless entity trying to exist.

Rhiannon, the love interest, is also a good person. She is kind, smart, pretty, and – unfortunately for A – loyal to her boyfriend. Throughout the book, A does anything to spend time with her and get to know her, however difficult it may be through the circumstances. A gets to know her through a personal email, a coffee shop, and opening up about the situation. Their budding romance is so pure, even if Justin (the boyfriend) is in the way. It’s astonishing to see the two go against all odds to be together.

After leaving the nerdy boy, Nathan Daldry, in the dirt miles away from his house after sneaking out to a party (very clearly something Nathan would never do), A is cutting it close to being found out. Nathan, the next day, knows something is wrong. He doesn’t hesitate to get in contact with the news and religious websites, blaming demon possessions. This causes A to be more careful, and keeps tabs on Nathan. He might be stirring up more and more trouble for a peculiar person like A.

There are many conflicts in this story, internal, external, and everything in between. A inhabits bodies of all shapes and sizes and stature and mental states. Yes, mental states. One of my favorite things about this book is that the author does not shy away from shedding light on all the different people in this world. In the book, A lives through a person with substance use addiction, and people with mental disorders such as OCD, anxiety, and depression. Even while A is in the body of a girl with severe depression, a connection is made with Rhiannan to somehow save the girl.

David Levithan so masterfully shows representation for so many different people; people who don’t identify as the gender they were birthed as, queer people, and people of all races and nationalities and shapes and sizes. The point being, the representation in this book is phenomenal.

It’s not too difficult to understand that I think Every Day is a great book. Published in August of 2012, it has received many positive reviews from many newspapers, all noting the staggeringly refreshing representation. A film adaptation was released in early 2018. David Levithan has been writing novels since 2003, including Boy Meets Boy and Two Boys Kissing, as well as several other works showcasing queer characters. Every Day is the first in its series, consisting of a “companion novel” Another Day (released in August 2015), the prequel Six Earlier Days (released November of 2012), and a sequel titled Someday coming out sometime this year.