Madeline has never been outside. Never felt the salty, invigorating coolness of the ocean. Never tasted the crispness of the oncoming fall.

Never been to a high school. Never fallen in love.

Never had her heart broken.

But then a boy moves next door. And her life changes forever.

My Rating

Three and a half stars. *throws confetti but with a sad smile*

An entertaining one sentence summary

There’s this girl and she’s like allergic to the air and grass and well everything, everything but then this dude moves in next door and he only ever wears black and he climbs around on trees and roofs and walls like he’s a monkey and he’s totally flirting with her and she’s like yes please and then they run off to Hawaii to snorkel with humuhumu-whatawhata-something-something fish and that was a bad idea.

More Entertaining Short Summaries

Phonetic Scrabble (which is like the coolest idea ever)

Fun illustrations for the child within (like bundt cakes and time passing techniques and even little dictionary definitions and book reviews)

IM-ing

Hawaii

Outer space

ARCHITECTURE

OVERPROTECTIVE MOTHERS

Air locks

Almost dying (fun)

LOVING THE BOOKS yo

Initial Thoughts

Being up-and-up on the latest YA hits (that was sarcasm, btw), I really wanted to check out Everything, Everything. I saw a trailer for the upcoming movie randomly pop up on my Facebook page and it looked fairly decent.

Plus, when I saw the cover, I was like YES I WILL LOVE YOU FOREVER.

Note: I think we have learned that Amanda only ever reads/chooses books because of their pretty covers. While this is not always true . . . I do tend to choose books based on the covers.

Entering the book, I was in love. Maddy was absolutely darling: she was sweet and super super smart. She also didn’t cuss, was HOMESCHOOLED and had a great relationship with her mother.

This had the makings of SUCH A GREAT BOOK.

Then comes Olly. Olly cusses quite a bit, which isn’t surprising because his dad is an idiot and cusses even more.

AS I WAS READING THIS BOOK, I was reading another book. It’s Christian nonfiction and one of the parts was about how touching people of the opposite gender is dangerous. Once you start, you can’t stop. I kid you not, I had both of the books open and as I was reading Everything, Everything, Maddy said:

I was like DUDE!! So true!

And we see a dangerous progression.

Maddy and Olly are okay with just pantomiming to each other through a window.

⬇️

They want to meet each other. So Maddy gets her nurse to arrange a meeting. They aren’t allowed to touch each other.

⬇️

A few weeks later they meet and and Olly grabs Maddy’s hand to help her with a handstand. Oops, accident . . . won’t happen again right? WRONG THIS IS YA FICTION.

⬇️

A few weeks later . . . Olly sits really close to Maddy.

⬇️

A few weeks later . . . Olly kisses Maddy.

⬇️

And then they run away together and there’s only one bed and . . . yeah. Not good.

This was definitely a God-thing for me to read this book in conjunction with the nonfiction one. It just proved to me that, yes. There is no end to desire. And there isn’t supposed to be within the bounds of marriage! That’s what the world doesn’t understand.

This book was full of beautiful imagery, deep characters, and amazing musings on the universe, but I must part it with a gift of only three and a half stars because of the messages:

Follow your heart (as usual)
Teens drifting away from their parents is normal
All love relationships end in intimacy meant for marriage
It’s okay to do something that could possibly kill you if you’re going to be happy
Love relationships make you crazy and that’s okay; you’ll be obsessed, out of whack, but that’s normal and just go with it. Make that person YOUR ALL in life and don’t look back.

SO . . .

What I did like

THE HAWAII
Phonetic Scrabble (becuz y not)
Maddy and Olly’s conversations (they reminded me of convos I’ve had)
Maddy’s wanting to REALLY LIVE
Her obsession with books

What I didn’t like

Maddy comes to the conclusion that teens are supposed to fall in love and not like their parents anymore. Their love affairs replace their bond to their parents. SO SAD!!
There was a gay dude (they always have to throw those in there)
The PG-13 scene (I’d say it’s more like M or R; regardless, I skipped it)
The climax was kind of like WHOA WHOA WHOA waht

More fave quotable quotes

A few months ago, I jumped off a cliff into a lake. Maddy’s experience was so much like mine I wanted to share it. Read the book for another even more beautiful passage about the feeling.

He nods. “I’ll go first. I won’t let you drown.” He jumps up and out and does a full somersault before arrowing into the water. A few seconds later he resurfaces and waves up to me. I wave back and then close my eyes to take stock of my situation, because jumping off a cliff seems like a pivotal moment when a little stock-taking should be done. Strangely, though, I felt like I don’t really want to think too much. Like Olly, I just want to jump. I teach out Olly’s face in the water and find him waiting for me. Considering what the future may hold, dumping off this cliff doesn’t seem so scary at all.