Title: We Are Okay
Author: Nina LaCour
Genre: YA Fiction
Length: 234 pages
My rating: ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
Blurb: You go through life thinking there’s so much you need…
Until you leave with only your phone, your wallet, and a picture of your mother.
Marin hasn’t spoken to anyone from her old life since the day she left everything behind. No one knows the truth about those final weeks. Not even her best friend, Mabel. But even thousands of miles away from the California coast, at college in New York, Marin still feels the pull of the life and tragedy she’s tried to outrun. Now, months later, alone in an emptied dorm for winter break, Marin waits. Mabel is coming to visit, and Marin will be forced to face everything that’s been left unsaid and finally confront the loneliness that has made a home in her heart.
My review: This is the first book I’ve read since HP that had me in tears. The story is beautifully sad, with grief, loss, and love at the heart of it. As I read, I felt myself empathizing with Marin, sensitive to the sharpness of her memories. There’s a wistfulness within the story, a longing to return to the familiar ground but it’s painfully obvious that whatever was once familiar has become a stranger to Marin. I lost my breath reading We Are Okay as if my own world was spinning. From Marin’s grief for the loss of her grandfather, the secrets she uncovered, her feelings for Mabel, her once best friend, and her decision to leave home with nothing, you find yourself spiraling into Marin’s experiences. You want her to find love, peace, and forgiveness. You feel for her. At least, I felt great compassion for her. We Are Okay is the first novel of Nina LaCour’s that I’ve read and honestly, I loved it. Even though its pages were soaked with sorrow and memories, I loved it.
I don’t want to spoil too much of the story, so I encourage you to read it. You owe it to yourself to fall in love with it <3 Tempted?
Find We Are Okay at https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/28243032-we-are-okay