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lovelykd's review against another edition
4.0
I received an ARC of Everything Must Go by Jenny Davis, via NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.
As of this post, the book had not yet been released.
There is plenty to unpack here--most of which I won't be able--but because I have only just finished reading, I am still processing the evolution of Flora Goldwasser. I could wait to write this later, but I'm afraid I'd lose the rawness of my thoughts.
Who is Flora? Flora is what some might call "extra".
Upon meeting her, you get the impression she took the long way around to "finding herself". The story is being told, in reverse, using notes, letters, emails, magazine articles, and memos.
The correspondence isn't only from Flora, but others considered pertinent to the telling of the story.
At 16 years of age, Flora has fallen head over heels in love (lust) with an artsy photog named Elijah Huck. Everything that follows, from the point of their meeting, tells the story of Flora's growth and evolution. Prior to that, despite whatever idea she has of herself, she is simply a girl who finds a pleasant distraction in a cute boy:
Elijah ignites a passion within Flora. The two work on a project together. Once the project ends, Flora decides to leave her rich New York life behind to follow Elijah to an exclusive (and unconventional) school in upstate New York.
However, when Elijah changes his plans and opts to go elsewhere, Flora decides to stay at the school--a place that shies away from all things trendy and modern in favor of connecting with more rooted ideals.
How Flora comes to grow--as a direct result is being surrounded by people who aren't impressed with living lives centered around materialism and social acceptance of gender norms--is the crux journey.
What she finds out about herself is the prize.
I enjoyed this book. I don't consider myself a feminist in the radical sense, but I do recognize the power in owning who you are--sexually and emotionally--and a lot of this book is about understanding one's primary role in the overall scheme of things.
How do you define who you are as a woman? A man? What defines the type of person you'll become? Who's responsible for YOUR narrative? Are you subscribing to what you want or what you think others want/expect of/from you?
All of these questions, and more, entered my mind as I read this book.
There were too many characters, and too much going on, to truly do justice to this book here. You really have to read it for yourself to understand.
I enjoyed seeing the various perspectives of each and every one of the female characters: Dean seemed the most the most in-touch with who she was, while Sinclair and Juna offered the reader a different embracing of their own femininity.
Elijah, the main antagonist (of sorts), opened up plenty of questions regarding the role the patriarchy plays in man's fear of intimacy and sexual inadequacy.
The very things Elijah seemingly is against, are the very things he (inadvertently) comes to embody: his objectification and rejection of Flora only lend further proof to how much further he has to go.
Even more, the character of Wink also calls into question the role powerful women play in the patriarchy. At least, she did for me.
Like I said, lots to unpack, and plenty of discussions worthy of having once the final page is turned.
The prose (or lack thereof) was a negative, for me. I would have liked to have seen more prose. Emails, letters, and magazine excerpts succeed in telling the story, but were also a bit of a distraction from it at times as well.
That's the main reason this book received four stars.
As of this post, the book had not yet been released.
There is plenty to unpack here--most of which I won't be able--but because I have only just finished reading, I am still processing the evolution of Flora Goldwasser. I could wait to write this later, but I'm afraid I'd lose the rawness of my thoughts.
Who is Flora? Flora is what some might call "extra".
Upon meeting her, you get the impression she took the long way around to "finding herself". The story is being told, in reverse, using notes, letters, emails, magazine articles, and memos.
The correspondence isn't only from Flora, but others considered pertinent to the telling of the story.
At 16 years of age, Flora has fallen head over heels in love (lust) with an artsy photog named Elijah Huck. Everything that follows, from the point of their meeting, tells the story of Flora's growth and evolution. Prior to that, despite whatever idea she has of herself, she is simply a girl who finds a pleasant distraction in a cute boy:
It wasn't that I needed his approval to exist. Even in this time of frissons and jittery stomachs, I knew my power without Elijah. I didn't need him to kiss me. I just really wanted him to, and that wild desire made my body feel like it was on fire. Let's be honest. I was in love, and it was the kind of love that made me forget myself.
Elijah ignites a passion within Flora. The two work on a project together. Once the project ends, Flora decides to leave her rich New York life behind to follow Elijah to an exclusive (and unconventional) school in upstate New York.
However, when Elijah changes his plans and opts to go elsewhere, Flora decides to stay at the school--a place that shies away from all things trendy and modern in favor of connecting with more rooted ideals.
How Flora comes to grow--as a direct result is being surrounded by people who aren't impressed with living lives centered around materialism and social acceptance of gender norms--is the crux journey.
What she finds out about herself is the prize.
I enjoyed this book. I don't consider myself a feminist in the radical sense, but I do recognize the power in owning who you are--sexually and emotionally--and a lot of this book is about understanding one's primary role in the overall scheme of things.
How do you define who you are as a woman? A man? What defines the type of person you'll become? Who's responsible for YOUR narrative? Are you subscribing to what you want or what you think others want/expect of/from you?
All of these questions, and more, entered my mind as I read this book.
There were too many characters, and too much going on, to truly do justice to this book here. You really have to read it for yourself to understand.
I enjoyed seeing the various perspectives of each and every one of the female characters: Dean seemed the most the most in-touch with who she was, while Sinclair and Juna offered the reader a different embracing of their own femininity.
Elijah, the main antagonist (of sorts), opened up plenty of questions regarding the role the patriarchy plays in man's fear of intimacy and sexual inadequacy.
The very things Elijah seemingly is against, are the very things he (inadvertently) comes to embody: his objectification and rejection of Flora only lend further proof to how much further he has to go.
Even more, the character of Wink also calls into question the role powerful women play in the patriarchy. At least, she did for me.
Like I said, lots to unpack, and plenty of discussions worthy of having once the final page is turned.
The prose (or lack thereof) was a negative, for me. I would have liked to have seen more prose. Emails, letters, and magazine excerpts succeed in telling the story, but were also a bit of a distraction from it at times as well.
That's the main reason this book received four stars.
mehsi's review against another edition
I received this book from Netgalley in exchange of an honest review.
20% in and I am noping my way out of this.
A bit longer review will come in September.
EDIT (since some people will always find fault in things): I will just leave a few quotes here which I found weird (grammatically, sentence-wise, or because it was TMI (Too much information)).
Please don't assume I am racist because I am talking about colour/etc. (that sentence just seemed odd to me, and I also discussed it with other people, and they also were a bit confused on the sentence), a hater of those who pee (Sorry, even if she has a bladder problem you just don't drop your pants and pee on the lawn, in full sight of everyone. Nope. Nope, and nope. It was also a bit too much information), or a hater of abortions (I just found that sentence weird and out of place, like, whut, where did that come from?). Ok, thanks. I will probably NOT be posting my full review here, and I may even remove it totally. I am not sure yet.
"And here's what happened -- I'm almost too grossed out to write this: the girl suddenly scampered down the porch steps, pulled down her cords and granny panties, squatted in the grass, and released a waterfall of neon-yellow urine onto the grass. In plain sight! In the light of day! The communal, gender-neutral bathroom was forty paces away!"
"...and the regular nanny is training to be an abortion doula this weekend."
"They're half black and half German..."
Yup, I am out of here. *waves and quickly runs away from this book*
20% in and I am noping my way out of this.
A bit longer review will come in September.
EDIT (since some people will always find fault in things): I will just leave a few quotes here which I found weird (grammatically, sentence-wise, or because it was TMI (Too much information)).
Please don't assume I am racist because I am talking about colour/etc. (that sentence just seemed odd to me, and I also discussed it with other people, and they also were a bit confused on the sentence), a hater of those who pee (Sorry, even if she has a bladder problem you just don't drop your pants and pee on the lawn, in full sight of everyone. Nope. Nope, and nope. It was also a bit too much information), or a hater of abortions (I just found that sentence weird and out of place, like, whut, where did that come from?). Ok, thanks. I will probably NOT be posting my full review here, and I may even remove it totally. I am not sure yet.
"And here's what happened -- I'm almost too grossed out to write this: the girl suddenly scampered down the porch steps, pulled down her cords and granny panties, squatted in the grass, and released a waterfall of neon-yellow urine onto the grass. In plain sight! In the light of day! The communal, gender-neutral bathroom was forty paces away!"
"...and the regular nanny is training to be an abortion doula this weekend."
"They're half black and half German..."
Yup, I am out of here. *waves and quickly runs away from this book*
ashction's review against another edition
5.0
What a strange, wonderful book this was.
I got my hands on an ARC copy rather than the now-published finished product, so I don't know how much of what I read still remains in the final draft. I mean, obviously it's largely the same, but there's certainly some minuscule differences that I'm curious about. (Also, how pretty is this book's hardcover? Is it even have as pretty as its' sleeve? I certainly hope so.)
I picked this book up half because of the gorgeous Pinterest-esque cover and half because I saw this book had a really good review here on Goodreads, and it was free, so it was really a no-brainer if I never read this anyway. And even though I have a stack of library books, unread, on my desk as I write this, I couldn't stop myself from picking this up in favor of the others. Though the book itself says the story is told in letters, journal entries, and interviews, I didn't expect to particularly enjoy the style or see anything productive happening for the narrative because of it. And yet, somehow, I'm mediating on a form that almost duplicates the identity crises of Flora throughout Everything Must Go.
Through this unorthodox format, we receive our narrator's interior thoughts in a particularly raw way - firsthand, through detailed journal entries and personal letters and emails. We also receive our outside characters' thoughts in a fascinating, complimentary narrative form; I can't recall novels where I've had so much access to secondary characters through so much one-sided dialogue. Not only are we provided more access to our narrator than previously available through the traditional format, but we also find ourselves privy to outside plots that, traditionally, stay hidden from the narrator and reader until they become the culmination of some central plot.
I think that discrepancy and divergence is what I loved most about this book. It effectively tells the story in a new, fresh way, and I think that's really hard to do in a market that is saturated with the same old narrative forms and cliches. I also found the message in this book to be fresh, and felt rewarded by the lack of clear clarification in identity for Flora. I rarely would say I felt satisfied by an open-ending; in fact, a lot of my reviews on here often feature a "I wish I knew what happened next, etc." comment somewhere in between my praise. But, in the case of Davis' novel, this open-ended, unsolved identity perfectly encapsulates the novel and its message. I like that this novel is, essentially, telling its readers that it's okay not to know, or to fit into multiple circles, and to be muddy and somewhere in-between and just not certain. I like that the confusion, discovery, and ambiguity is acceptable and welcome; it feels like authors - and YA contemporary authors, especially - are always ending with some resolution on identity, or some understanding of who you are and what you have become after the circumstances you deal with. Flora deals with a lot, but her outcome is uncertain and open; as she says herself, who says she can't be somewhere "in the middle" of all these identities she's finding in herself? I think that's incredibly true, and so accurate for teens and adults in their twenties as we all try to find ourselves, only to discover that we do contain those "multitudes" which Whitman writes about.
Davis praises all of these aspects of Flora, and breaks down stigma and fear of acceptance and expectation identity while also dealing with numerous other social and gender issues that I'm proud to see tackled in an all-inclusive way, even if it's a little wacky. I didn't expect this book to really be so magnificent and appealing and thoughtful, and it was a welcome surprise to join Flora on this journey and to read Davis' first book. I'll look for the next one and hope it's at least half as informed as this first one!
I got my hands on an ARC copy rather than the now-published finished product, so I don't know how much of what I read still remains in the final draft. I mean, obviously it's largely the same, but there's certainly some minuscule differences that I'm curious about. (Also, how pretty is this book's hardcover? Is it even have as pretty as its' sleeve? I certainly hope so.)
I picked this book up half because of the gorgeous Pinterest-esque cover and half because I saw this book had a really good review here on Goodreads, and it was free, so it was really a no-brainer if I never read this anyway. And even though I have a stack of library books, unread, on my desk as I write this, I couldn't stop myself from picking this up in favor of the others. Though the book itself says the story is told in letters, journal entries, and interviews, I didn't expect to particularly enjoy the style or see anything productive happening for the narrative because of it. And yet, somehow, I'm mediating on a form that almost duplicates the identity crises of Flora throughout Everything Must Go.
Through this unorthodox format, we receive our narrator's interior thoughts in a particularly raw way - firsthand, through detailed journal entries and personal letters and emails. We also receive our outside characters' thoughts in a fascinating, complimentary narrative form; I can't recall novels where I've had so much access to secondary characters through so much one-sided dialogue. Not only are we provided more access to our narrator than previously available through the traditional format, but we also find ourselves privy to outside plots that, traditionally, stay hidden from the narrator and reader until they become the culmination of some central plot.
I think that discrepancy and divergence is what I loved most about this book. It effectively tells the story in a new, fresh way, and I think that's really hard to do in a market that is saturated with the same old narrative forms and cliches. I also found the message in this book to be fresh, and felt rewarded by the lack of clear clarification in identity for Flora. I rarely would say I felt satisfied by an open-ending; in fact, a lot of my reviews on here often feature a "I wish I knew what happened next, etc." comment somewhere in between my praise. But, in the case of Davis' novel, this open-ended, unsolved identity perfectly encapsulates the novel and its message. I like that this novel is, essentially, telling its readers that it's okay not to know, or to fit into multiple circles, and to be muddy and somewhere in-between and just not certain. I like that the confusion, discovery, and ambiguity is acceptable and welcome; it feels like authors - and YA contemporary authors, especially - are always ending with some resolution on identity, or some understanding of who you are and what you have become after the circumstances you deal with. Flora deals with a lot, but her outcome is uncertain and open; as she says herself, who says she can't be somewhere "in the middle" of all these identities she's finding in herself? I think that's incredibly true, and so accurate for teens and adults in their twenties as we all try to find ourselves, only to discover that we do contain those "multitudes" which Whitman writes about.
Davis praises all of these aspects of Flora, and breaks down stigma and fear of acceptance and expectation identity while also dealing with numerous other social and gender issues that I'm proud to see tackled in an all-inclusive way, even if it's a little wacky. I didn't expect this book to really be so magnificent and appealing and thoughtful, and it was a welcome surprise to join Flora on this journey and to read Davis' first book. I'll look for the next one and hope it's at least half as informed as this first one!
alidottie's review against another edition
3.0
Someone remind me not to try to add goodreads reviews on my phone that are longer than one sentence! I'm always about a paragraph in when the app closes and I lose my review. :(
Anyway, this book should be read, not listened to. It is told through emails, letters and journal entries which I normally enjoy in a book, but it was quite annoying to have to hear " [date}, {time} to . . . Re: . . ." for one or two word responses over and over again. This book also featured and alternative high school named "Quarme" which almost always sounds like the narrator is saying "queer." I wonder if it is unstatedly on purpose.
Overall, an interesting story about a teenage girl deciding (without really looking to) what is actually important in life. It captures how confusing these years are for most youth. Also, I saw how harmful checked out parents are. One of my soapbox issues: just because a person is adult-sized, it does not mean they are an adult.
Anyway, this book should be read, not listened to. It is told through emails, letters and journal entries which I normally enjoy in a book, but it was quite annoying to have to hear " [date}, {time} to . . . Re: . . ." for one or two word responses over and over again. This book also featured and alternative high school named "Quarme" which almost always sounds like the narrator is saying "queer." I wonder if it is unstatedly on purpose.
Overall, an interesting story about a teenage girl deciding (without really looking to) what is actually important in life. It captures how confusing these years are for most youth. Also, I saw how harmful checked out parents are. One of my soapbox issues: just because a person is adult-sized, it does not mean they are an adult.
samabenamer's review against another edition
5.0
this is a really good book about a prep-school girl's journey in finding who she is and what she wants in terms of feminism. it reminds me a lot of "bad feminist" in that flora goldwasser is discovering who she is as a feminist, because before joining her environmental based school in place of her prep-school, she thought she had everything she needed and knew everything she needed to know, but after an event "hollows her out" she finds there are more important things to fill her up with rather than sex and materialistic things because she describes these things as almost transactions to the point that the appeal is lost in these things. it's really well-written and i aspire to write at the same quality as flora m. goldwasser.
colefree224's review against another edition
3.0
As a teen I feel like I would have internalized this, chopped it up like my required reading, and found all the nuances there was to find. Then imagine more as I prepared myself to be the writer and reader I would be in my future.
As a 37 year old, I remember how absolutely exhausting it was to feel so much in so little. I miss it and am so greatful I made it through to the other side - all in one thought.
As a 37 year old, I remember how absolutely exhausting it was to feel so much in so little. I miss it and am so greatful I made it through to the other side - all in one thought.
cimorene1558's review against another edition
4.0
Cute, but with some serious stuff. As someone who grew up somewhat Quare-style, I can appreciate that part very much! Had I ever gone to school before university, I would have fit in very well at a place like Quare!
hellomadalyn's review against another edition
4.0
This review originally appeared on Novel Ink.
Thanks so much to St. Martin’s Press for providing me with an e-ARC of this book! I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review, but that does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Everything Must Go was certainly not the book I expected, from start to finish. However, the book I actually got was a bit of a hidden gem. This book was smart, funny, and feminist. It’s definitely one of the more *~intelligent~* YA contemporaries I’ve read recently, but the writing never took itself too seriously or came off as pretentious. This is a story about making mistakes and somehow finding yourself along the way.
One thing I adored about Everything Must Go was the format. The story is told through a collection of documents, from letters, to emails, to journal entries, to blog posts. (Side note: the formatting was a little wonky on the e-ARC. This is a book I’d probably recommend reading a physical copy of for the best experience.) The actual plot is a bit hard to describe– and, besides, I think this is the sort of book where it’s best to go in blind– but it follows our protagonist, Flora Goldwasser, as she falls in love with her older history tutor and subsequently decides to leave her prep school in Manhattan and follow him to Quare Academy, a Quaker school of about 30 students in upstate New York.
Even though the story has no real narrator– although present-day Flora does add some asides in between documents occasionally– I really got a sense of who Flora was through the correspondence she sends to her loved ones. I loved reading from Flora’s perspective. She is definitely not a standard quiet, reserved YA protagonist. She’s loud, opinionated, brash, impulsive. And I loved her for all of these qualities. At first I thought she was going to be a typical manic pixie dreamgirl type (seriously, she only wears vintage clothes, lives in Manhattan, and followed a boy she barely knows to a school she didn’t even want to attend), but she redeemed herself over the course of the story. She made some enormous mistakes, but she really made the best of every situation she got herself into. I just love reading about YA protagonists who are loud and impulsive… because that’s who I was as a teenager. One thing I appreciated was the way she acknowledged and checked her own privilege (and also how the people around her weren’t afraid to call her on it).
I also loved the cast of characters who went to Quare with Flora– they were all so different, and they all taught Flora different things and helped her on her journey of finding herself. She went through such immense character growth over the course of this story, and a lot of it was brought on by Quare. Flora’s day-to-day life at Quare was hilarious and stereotypical and made all the more funny through reading her own accounts of the weird things she witnessed in the letters she wrote to her friends and family back in Manhattan. And this is totally nerdy, but I also loved reading about the coursework at Quare. It was so feminist and progressive and intersectional. I was here for it. The school setting played a large role in the story, as opposed to simply standing as filler.
I enjoyed the Miss Tulip side plot, too. I’m trying to be vague– because spoilers– but I was really curious to see how all of that would wrap up, and the ending did not disappoint. In fact, I loved the ending of this book so much. It was a bit ambiguous, but it was done so well.
All in all, I applaud Jenny Fran Davis for managing to pull off such a peculiar story in such a fantastic, smart way. Everything Must Go is a book that I find impossible to describe, but if I had to summarize it in three words, they would be: witty, feminist, surprising. I highly recommend checking this one out if you’re looking for YA contemporary with excellent feminist commentary and a story that might surprise you in the best way.
Thanks so much to St. Martin’s Press for providing me with an e-ARC of this book! I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review, but that does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
Everything Must Go was certainly not the book I expected, from start to finish. However, the book I actually got was a bit of a hidden gem. This book was smart, funny, and feminist. It’s definitely one of the more *~intelligent~* YA contemporaries I’ve read recently, but the writing never took itself too seriously or came off as pretentious. This is a story about making mistakes and somehow finding yourself along the way.
One thing I adored about Everything Must Go was the format. The story is told through a collection of documents, from letters, to emails, to journal entries, to blog posts. (Side note: the formatting was a little wonky on the e-ARC. This is a book I’d probably recommend reading a physical copy of for the best experience.) The actual plot is a bit hard to describe– and, besides, I think this is the sort of book where it’s best to go in blind– but it follows our protagonist, Flora Goldwasser, as she falls in love with her older history tutor and subsequently decides to leave her prep school in Manhattan and follow him to Quare Academy, a Quaker school of about 30 students in upstate New York.
Even though the story has no real narrator– although present-day Flora does add some asides in between documents occasionally– I really got a sense of who Flora was through the correspondence she sends to her loved ones. I loved reading from Flora’s perspective. She is definitely not a standard quiet, reserved YA protagonist. She’s loud, opinionated, brash, impulsive. And I loved her for all of these qualities. At first I thought she was going to be a typical manic pixie dreamgirl type (seriously, she only wears vintage clothes, lives in Manhattan, and followed a boy she barely knows to a school she didn’t even want to attend), but she redeemed herself over the course of the story. She made some enormous mistakes, but she really made the best of every situation she got herself into. I just love reading about YA protagonists who are loud and impulsive… because that’s who I was as a teenager. One thing I appreciated was the way she acknowledged and checked her own privilege (and also how the people around her weren’t afraid to call her on it).
I also loved the cast of characters who went to Quare with Flora– they were all so different, and they all taught Flora different things and helped her on her journey of finding herself. She went through such immense character growth over the course of this story, and a lot of it was brought on by Quare. Flora’s day-to-day life at Quare was hilarious and stereotypical and made all the more funny through reading her own accounts of the weird things she witnessed in the letters she wrote to her friends and family back in Manhattan. And this is totally nerdy, but I also loved reading about the coursework at Quare. It was so feminist and progressive and intersectional. I was here for it. The school setting played a large role in the story, as opposed to simply standing as filler.
I enjoyed the Miss Tulip side plot, too. I’m trying to be vague– because spoilers– but I was really curious to see how all of that would wrap up, and the ending did not disappoint. In fact, I loved the ending of this book so much. It was a bit ambiguous, but it was done so well.
All in all, I applaud Jenny Fran Davis for managing to pull off such a peculiar story in such a fantastic, smart way. Everything Must Go is a book that I find impossible to describe, but if I had to summarize it in three words, they would be: witty, feminist, surprising. I highly recommend checking this one out if you’re looking for YA contemporary with excellent feminist commentary and a story that might surprise you in the best way.
rebelqueen's review against another edition
1.0
Everything must go indeed, including this book. Flora decided to apply to a prep school because she has a crush on a young man who is going to be a teacher there (ew). The age difference is only a couple years, but I don’t love the student/ teacher romance thing at all. She gets accepted, but the dude decided to not be a teacher there, but then she goes anyway. It’s a Quaker school so she describes it as hippy and nontraditional. Okay. This book examines a lot of modern issues, but it tries to do them all. It had some good body positivity, but that doesn’t make up for the rest of the mess.