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Walker Hayes Discusses His Forthcoming Book Based on His Song "Craig"

Hayes says his book collaborator Craig Cooper has "always offered [him] a shoulder to lean on"

For Walker Hayes, following up on the extraordinary popularity of his single "Fancy Like" will involve his first-ever book based on his viral radio smash's same simple, uncomplicated values. Glad You’re Here! will see the veteran Nashville crooner pairing with his longtime friend and collaborator Craig Cooper. The book's title is tied to Cooper too, as it relates to Hayes' 2017 single “Craig.”

The book has no date for publication yet but will be produced by Moody Publishing, a nonprofit organization that publishes Christian books. Not unlike the eponymous song, Hayes' book explores the friendship between Hayes and Cooper. Hayes notes to Music Mayhem Magazine that topics covered in the book include spirituality, his battle with alcoholism, and he and his wife losing their seventh child, Oakleigh Klover Hayes. Craig, whom the performer met at a church in Franklin, Tennessee, "always offered a shoulder to lean on," he says.

Continuing, he adds, "When I met Craig, I was an alcoholic, and now I will be six years sober in October. So man, [this book] documents our life together and what an impact [Craig] and his family had on us and why, which is just because of Christ. The funny thing is when I wrote the song, ‘Craig,’ I did not say the name of Jesus because I would have denied him at that point in my life, I did not believe in Jesus. And while that saddens me, now he’s all I want to sing about. And that’s largely what the song is about, just through unlikely friends becoming neighbors."

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