In Dream House, author Gabriel Adels leads readers on a tour of the renovations he completed to his West Philadelphia home after purchasing it in a dilapidated state at the height of the Coronavirus pandemic. Adels tells the story of entering the world of construction, finding a mentor, and finally, testing his limits on the project. It turns out to be a reckoning with all of the choices he's made throughout his 20s, living a bohemian lifestyle amidst the poverty and racial tension of his beloved neighborhood. Dream House shows how rewarding and destabilizing it can be to follow your dreams, especially when you are honest about what they reveal.
In GABETOUR, Gabriel Adels carries us with him as he bicycles across the United States- one year after surviving a car crash that broke his femur and killed his brother. In a rare combination of narrative and songwriting, Adels tells his energetic story of healing through adventure and music. GABETOUR’s sure strength is in its unabashed willingness to explore pain through creative commitment. There are no easy answers here; GABETOUR evokes the wholehearted courage to heal by being fully alive.
"If you start writing, if you start making music, healing comes. Haltingly, slowly, on its own time frame, but it comes. Sometimes it is a recognizable transformation and sometimes it is just an echo or a memory surfacing. I love this book because it listens to the echoes and the ghosts. Because it is not afraid to look at healing and how it happens. I love this book because music and motion and friendships and grief and journey and heartbreak and brothers and remembering are all part of the same becoming, in dream and in waking. I love this book because it is brave-hearted and tender. I love this book because sometimes you have to take yourself very far away from what you know in order to find what lives in you. I love this book because it is healing laid bare on the page and an invitation to the reader to join in the process. I love the attention to detail and raw truth in this book. In the end, the experiences we live through change everything about us, and also leave us planted firmly in our familiar and consistent selves. This book tells that story. This books is about leaning fully into all of the growth and discomfort, the beauty and awe."
-Rabbi Monica Gomery, SVARA: A Traditionally Radical Yeshiva, author Of Darkness and Tumbling
"Gabetour is a profoundly moving exploration of loss and maturation suited for anyone. Adels does not self-censor his grief or feelings: they are laid bare in their alternately raw, beautiful, joyous, ugly, and cloudy forms. He selflessly reveals an inner struggle while alternately feeling and fleeing from loss, and learning to adapt and contend with monumental guilt and isolation. This is an incredibly moving, honest, and well-crafted portrayal of life, death, growth, malaise, anger, and love."
-Timothy Donovan, Master Carpenter, Axiom Custom Products