This book is not for everyone. For me though, it was beautiful. Beautiful in its gutted heart and soul, its raw emotion, its incredibly precise writing, and its palpable heart ache. And its truth, according to David Payne in his recent memoir, Barefoot to Avalon: A Brother’s Story. It’s Payne’s story and his brother’s of growing up with an angry, alcoholic father, of playing favorites, and not being able to speak the truth.  It’s of Payne’s brother, George A., with mental illness, his tragic death, and Payne’s own manic struggle to leave behind, then reconcile his family ties.

The book is dark. This is Payne’s therapeutic release from the guilt he has around his brother - not just his death, but in his life, diagnosed with bipolar disorder and having had several psychotic breakdowns. George A., as Payne describes wins by losing. That is, he gains the affection and attention of his divorced parents; attention Payne feels cheated of. Yet George A. earns this by breaking down. We see the brothers converge at family events and holidays, yet fade from each other’s lives in their separation, becoming two very different individuals - financial broker versus writer; conservative versus liberal; encircled by family versus trying to escape the family he was born into.