Everything We Could Do: A Novel

by David McGlynn

Set against the backdrop of a small-town Wisconsin NICU, a sweeping story of parenthood, family, and redemption

After a decade of miscarriages, Brooke Jensen is finally pregnant—with quadruplets. When she goes into labor after twenty-three weeks, Brooke and her husband rush to the hospital in the small town of Hanover, Wisconsin. For the 203 days that follow, they’re plunged into the terrifying and mysterious netherworld of the neonatal intensive care unit.

As the babies grow and struggle, fall turns to stark upper-Midwest winter. Brooke bonds with Dash, a senior nurse whose son, Landon, had been a patient in the NICU years earlier and is now straining his parents’ abilities to care for him. Both families bend and edge closer to breaking, and the questions mount: What does love look like? What does it mean to save a life?

A fiercely honest portrait of American parenthood, the American healthcare system, and Rust Belt communities, Everything We Could Do lays bare the ways that families are formed and remade in times of crisis.

Genres: Fiction

456 pages, Paperback

Published September 15, 2025

About the author

DAVID McGLYNN was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and grew up in Houston, Texas and Orange County, California. He graduated in 1998 with a B.A. in English and Philosophy from the University of California, Irvine. He received an M.F.A. in 2001 and a Ph.D. in 2006 from the University of Utah, where he also served as Managing Editor of Western Humanities Review. His fiction and creative nonfiction have appeared in Alaska Quarterly Review, Image, Mid-American Review, Shenandoah, and other literary journals. He currently teaches at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin, where he lives with his wife and sons.

A lifelong swimmer, he was captain of the swimming and diving team at UC Irvine. He captured a national championship in the 500-yard freestyle at the 2001 United States Masters Nationals. He now competes in open-water races, and on most mornings is the first one in the pool.

Reviews

[Katie Ziegler (Life Between Words) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything We Could Do is a compelling and emotionally resonant character study. McGlynn’s characters are messy, flawed, and true to life, and he writes their struggles with a level of honesty that can be difficult to sit with at times. The midpoint of the novel is especially bleak, and there were moments that were genuinely hard to read.

Even so, the story ultimately moves toward a sense of hope and redemption that feels both grounded and earned. Despite being character-driven, the book maintained strong momentum, and I found myself turning pages simply to see where these characters would end up. I loved this book!

Readers who appreciate introspective, emotionally complex fiction—especially fans of Claire Lombardo, Mary Beth Keane, Elizabeth Strout, and Ann Patchett—will find much to love here.

A challenging but worthwhile read, and one that will stay with me.

[Dorinda · Rating 2 out of 5]

I found two medical errors that should have been fixed. Page 73: "Latria had been the one(nurse) to pull the catheter from her "Ureter" ....no should be urethra. Page 393: Dash is looking at Landon's monitors after frostbite incident . "His heart rate was "one thirty", slow but okay". Again no Landon is 17 years old a heart rate of 130 is tachycardia & concerning. 130 would not be considered slow & okay!
Very difficult to write a book with medical /nursing detail when not either. I found Brooke unlikeable & her interior emotional thinking not always how a woman would feel or think.

[Kathleen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everything We Could Do is a magnificent story of love, loss and, most of all, hope. After years of struggles with infertility, Brooke Jensen is pregnant with quadruplets and refuses reduction surgery. Then her babies are born at twenty three weeks. Two girls die almost immediately. She and her husband Harper become constant visitors to the NICU where son Emery has serious, life threatening problems and daughter Opal is doing well for such a tiny baby. The babies’ nurse Dash (Dolores) Coenen has her own problems. Her seventeen year old son Landon, was born prematurely and suffered a catastrophic brain bleed. His rages have become uncontrollable and he poses a danger to his family. The stress on both the Jensen and Coenen families grows until events cause serious issues they may never recover from.

Author David McGlynn drew on personal experience to write this novel. His descriptions of the NICU are vivid and detailed. The characters, Brooke and Harper, Dah and Mike, are so real you feel their pain and confusion. My favorite scene is when Julius Robinette visits the NICU at Christmas. Everything We Could Do will stay with you long after you finish the last page. 5 stars.

Thank you to NetGalley, Northwestern University Press and David McGlynn for this ARC.

[Olivia · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fabulous book. A storyteller both on the page and in person David McGlynns‘s Everything We Could Do is a beautiful and deeply moving exploration of family, loss, and the quiet resilience that carries people through grief. McGlynn captures the ache of ordinary life, the way love and pain intertwine the unspoken intentions that hold a family together and the small moments of grace and that make endurance possible.

His prose is spare but luminous full of tenderness and plenty of his recognizable humor. Like Wally Lamb, McGlynn writes with both empathy and insight, showing us characters who are flawed and human who stumble and try again and who ultimately find connection and unexpected places.

Everything We Could Do reminds us that even in out most uncertain moments, joy can be rebuilt, not as a return to what was lost, but something newly earned through compassionate and understanding. A remarkable and generous book, told by a writer who sees the world with rare clarity.

[Melanie Rae · Rating 5 out of 5]

David McGlynn’s passionate devotion to his people and their circumstances, his capacious heart and mind, and his intimate engagement with medical research and ethical inquiry invite the reader to explore the limits of her own curiosity and compassion. Through the lives of Dash and Brooke, Emery and Opal, Atlantis, Justus, Landon, Mike, Harper, Oliver, and many others, Everything We Could Do delivers us to a world where gravity and grace abound—and love abides—making it possible to keep faith through months of loss and sorrow. Hope in this world, in our world, comes to us not through miracles or magical thinking, but through attention, care, responsiveness, camaraderie, and forgiveness—a willingness to suspend expectations and thereby embrace tenderness and joy day by day, moment by moment.

[Maggie Ginsberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Devastating, profoundly human and, ultimately, hopeful.
Updated to add: Finished this novel last night, still thinking about it this morning. EVERYTHING WE COULD DO peeled back some real-life layers I don’t often see in fiction: the breathtakingly suspended world of the neonatal intensive care unit, the unique challenges of parenting young adults with autism. Then there’s the glorious push-pull of long-term intimate partnerships, and the ways we rely on (or block) love from all directions. Skilled authors treating messy characters with empathy is my favorite mood. Makes me feel like I’ll be okay, no matter what.

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

McGlynn weaves two powerful stories: the terrifying struggle of parents Brooke and her husband after premature birth, and the life of Dash, a nurse whose work heroism is matched by raising her adolescent son with special needs. A stunning tale on the relentless emotional demands of caregiving and fierce parental love. A must-read.

[Christine Sorensen Jeske · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful book. Deals with lots of heavy issues - autism spectrum, foster care, disability, addiction, as well as the NICU - and does so with grace and sensitivity. Page-turning and heart-warming.

[Barbara Van · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book. It held my interest throughout. The fact that the setting was where I live in Wisconsin made it even better.

[Anna F · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve always been obsessed with stories like these and I think this book talked about it really well! Only con is that it made me start romanticizing Wisconsin