We Are Okay

by Nina LaCour

Paperback, 2019

Status

Checked out

Publication

Penguin Books (2019), Edition: Reprint, 256 pages

Description

Young Adult Fiction. Young Adult Literature. LGBTQIA+ (Fiction.) HTML:Winner of the 2018 Michael L. Printz Award — An achingly beautiful novel about grief and the enduring power of friendship. “Short, poetic and gorgeously written.” —The New York Times Book Review “A beautiful, devastating piece of art." —Bookpage 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.   An intimate whisper that packs an indelible punch, We Are Okay is Nina LaCour at her finest. This gorgeously crafted and achingly honest portrayal of grief will leave you urgent to reach across any distance to reconnect with the people you love. Praise for We Are Okay  “Nina LaCour treats her emotions so beautifully and with such empathy.” —Bustle ? “Exquisite.” —Kirkus ? “LaCour paints a captivating depiction of loss, bewilderment, and emotional paralysis . . . raw and beautiful.” —Booklist ? “Beautifully crafted . . . . A quietly moving, potent novel.” —SLJ ? “A moving portrait of a girl struggling to rebound after everything she’s known has been thrown into disarray.” —Publishers Weekly ?"Bittersweet and hopeful . . . poetic and skillfully crafted." —Shelf Awareness “So lonely and beautiful that I could hardly breathe. This is a perfect book.” —Stephanie Perkins, bestselling author of Anna and the French Kiss “As beautiful as the best memories, as sad as the best songs, as hopeful as your best dreams.” —Siobhan Vivian, bestselling author of The Last Boy and Girl in the World “You can feel every peak and valley of Marin’s emotional journey on your skin, in your gut. Beautifully written, heartfelt, and deeply real.” —Adi Alsaid, author of Never Always Sometimes and Let’s Get Lost.… (more)

Rating

(320 ratings; 4)

User reviews

LibraryThing member olegalCA
I love Nina LaCour's books - my only complaint about this one? Too short!
LibraryThing member maggie1961
This book is about grief and loss, both by death and separation.
Marin doesn't remember her mother. She lives with her grandfather but their lives are separate for the most part. After his death, she's all alone and has no one. Everything she thought she knew was a lie. She put distance between
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herself and her best friend Mabel and withdraws completely.
I wanted to like it. I did love the writing style which is why I gave it a 2. It just didn't work for me. I was waiting for a huge explosion that never came and I actually was a little bored. I was glad it was a quick read.
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LibraryThing member Brainannex
I love Nina Lacour so much. She writes characters who are imperfect and fragile in their own ways and dance around each other in such clever ways. Marin has moved to college after suffering a loss and her best friend Mabel has been trying to reach out to her. Now it's Christmas break and Mabel is
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flying out to see Marin and get some answers.
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LibraryThing member LisMB
Add this to your TBR. Tissues needed for the last few chapters. An endearing ending. I did not know anything about this book, other than the description inside the book's sleeve. I found this as I browsed my local library and am very pleased that I did. I may end up buying a copy to keep and pass
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on. This is one to be shared!
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LibraryThing member EdGoldberg
Ms. LaCour can pack a lot into three days, which is the time span of her latest novel, We Are Okay. (By the way, it only took me two days to read, it’s that engrossing.) Mabel’s mother died when she was young and she lived with her grandfather, each having their own bedroom and sharing the
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common space of the kitchen, living room and dining room. Respecting each other’s privacy, neither ventured into the inner sanctum of the other.

But one summer day after high school graduation, Gramps doesn’t answer when Marin comes home. Busy with summer fun and new girlfriend, Mabel, Marin has pretty much ignored Gramps, minimizing his failing health. Fearing the worst, Marin enters her grandfather’s bedroom, which actually consists of a sitting room and adjoining room and discovers something she never thought existed and which changed her opinion of Gramps forever.

The police are called and a shaken Marin is taken to the police station but rather than go home with Mabel’s parents (who are almost like a second set of parents) she slips out the back door and boards a bus from California to upstate New York and college with nothing but the shirt on her back, her cell phone and her debit card, even though school doesn’t start for two weeks. She ignores Mabel’s frantic texts for weeks before they dwindle into non-existence.

However, Mabel hasn’t given up and visits Marin at school for three days over Christmas break, which is where the story unfolds.

Through the action of the present and flashbacks to the previous summer, readers understand the torture that these two young women underwent, the loss of a grandparent, the loss of a friend. But it also reinforces the concept of family which is not just biological commonality. Mabel and Marin are endearing characters. You like them immediately. Their pain is understandable. The awkwardness of their reunion is palpable.

We Are Okay is both happy and sad and wonderful. And should you like it, don’t forget Everything Leads to You and Hold Still.
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LibraryThing member bucketofrhymes
A beautiful, quiet examination of grief and loss.
LibraryThing member caitief
Absolutely beautiful and heartbreaking and stunning all at once.
LibraryThing member Quica
I can’t remember the last time I read a book in one sitting. What a truly moving and memorable story. An honest and touching examination of grief.
LibraryThing member electrascaife
Marin is alone in her NY freshman college dorm, which is emptied for the winter break. But she's also alone in all sorts of other ways; she's cut herself off from her old life in California, both terrified of and embracing the loneliness of losing her grandfather, her only family. Now Mabel is
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coming to visit her and she both longs for and dreads the company.
I can't begin to describe this book in any way that will do it the justice it deserves. The story unfolds slowly, delicately (you feel that if, like a very old bit of folded paper, it didn't do so gently it would crumble beneath your fingers and be lost), and it is gorgeous and stark, sad and wonderful. I loved Marin from the first page to the last and cried a whole spectrum of tears with her and for her.
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LibraryThing member mjspear
An achingly sensitive look at loss and loneliness. California teen, Marin lives at the beach with her grandfather. Her mother died in a surfboard accident when she was a baby. She has loving, attentive neighbors and "Gramps" is kind to her in a detached way (e.g., their house is divided in half:
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her space and his; they literally meet in the middle). After a cataclismic event, Marin is suddenly and completely alone. In a shell-shocked state, Marin heads off to college early (rural NY) and, as the book opens, she is facing winter (Christmas) break alone on campus. Her aloneness is palatable, matched by a psychic inertia to change her situation. When her former best friend and neighbor, Mabel, arrives Marin slowly emerges from her isolation and grief. There is a minor theme of homosexuality (M & M's love turns physical for a brief time) but it is cast more in the light of what might have been. As sad as the book is, it ends on a hopeful note (a somewhat deux-es-machina turn of events). Still, anyone who has ever felt --or been-- alone will relate to Marin and root for her recovery.
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LibraryThing member MaowangVater
Marin Delaney is alone in her dorm room in New York. It’s winter break and she’s the only student left on campus. She declined her roommate’s invitation to spend the time with her and assured her that she’ll be okay. But she’s not. She misses the California sunshine, the beach, the
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seagulls, and the surf. Since she was three and left an orphan to be raised by her grandfather that’s where she she’s lived, near the beach, in suburban San Francisco. The dark cold of rural New York in the dead of winter is as far away as it can be from her old life.

Her high school friend Mabel is coming for a visit, and Marin is very anxious about the visit. She hasn’t spoken or returned any of Mabel’s texts or messages since she left for college. Mabel has been her closest friend for many years, and the summer before they left for college they’d become even closer. Mabel left, and then Marin’s grandfather disappeared, swallowed by the ocean.
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LibraryThing member foggidawn
It’s winter break, and Marin is alone in her college dorm. Alone, because her only relative, Gramps, died a few weeks before the semester began. On the day he died, Marin discovered something that made her question everything about her life with Gramps. Now, her best friend Mabel is on her way to
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visit, and Marin will finally face the events of the past summer: what happened with Mabel, what she learned about Gramps, and why she reacted the way she did on that terrible night.

This is a spare but deeply emotional read. It circles from the present to the past and back, drawing the reader gently but inexorably into Marin’s story. Though not heavy on plot, it’s a compelling read. It deals with heavy issues in a way that is ultimately comforting. If this description appeals to you, you will probably love this book. I think it’s the sort of story that will stay with me for a long time.
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LibraryThing member bookandsword
4/5 stars (but more like 3.5)

“We were miraculous.
We were beach creatures.
We had treasures in our pockets and each other on our skin.”

4 stars are mostly symbolic - they are for the feelings, the ambience and the writing. The book itself is not spectacular, nor is it as emotionally devastating
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as I hoped. The plot also wishes for better - so many unexplained holes. But for some reason I just really enjoyed reading it. It transports you places - sunny beach in California, dark nights on the wet sand, cold and empty New York, empty dorm room.

“I wonder if there's a secret current that connects people who have lost something. Not in the way that everyone loses something, but in the way that undoes your life, undoes your self, so that when you look at your face it isn't yours anymore.”

If you are looking for a plot driven book - this is not a book for you, it might actually bore you to death. This is a slow book that reads very much like a dairy in present tense. It's more of a journal of musings and feelings and contemplations than anything else. But somehow, on some level it works.

There were ridiculous things that were so obviously overlooked - such as girls never even doubted in their minds that maybe it wasn't a good idea go to strangers house just because he offered nicely, even if it's storming and he is school's house keeper. I was baffled at how gullible they were, if this was a tv show that situation would probably have ended in rape or murder.

There was also such vast emptiness around everything - names and things were thrown around, but none of them ever had any more page time than just a few sentences - fleeting and abrupt. I understand that this is the style of the whole book, but still I wished for things to feel a bit more...finished.

“I could say the night felt magical, but that would be embellishment.
That would be romanticization.
What it actually felt like was life.”

Overall if I had to describe the book in 3 words I'd say:
​Raw, simple, sensual.

I also enjoyed how Marin's views were very much minimalistic and how every object she owned had a meaning and a place - it was something I could really relate to. Also, I absolutely adored the cover. We are okay is a very quick read that will appeal t many, but definitely not all.

“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.”
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LibraryThing member ewyatt
A quiet, retrospective novel about a girl who has moved, fled really, from California to New York after the death of her grandfather. She is the only person left in the dorm over break when her best friend, Mabel comes to visit. The two of them have an uneasy time together as there is silence and
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secrets between them. Much of the novel takes place in Marin's head as she thinks back on her life and what the loss of her grandfather means for her and how she'll move forward. Beautiful and sad.
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LibraryThing member rabidgummibear
This is such a unique book. It's really hard to review honestly. It's not for those who want a straight path through a story but instead want to take a journey through relationships. The writing relies heavily on that and not plot.

I really enjoyed my time with it.
LibraryThing member ecataldi
I'm going to be completely honest, I initially picked up this book because of the badass cover. It's intriguing, I had to know what it was about. I discovered a quick read (like 2 hours only) about a young girl who flees her old life in California to start anew at a college in New York. Told in
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alternating timelines (the past summer and the current Christmas break); Marin struggles as her estranged best friend flies out to see her for three days. They haven't spoken since Marin fled California and questions need to be answered, relationships discussed. There is good suspense as the reader tries to figure out what actually happened to Marin and wonder as to what she's going to do with her life. This book also explores themes of homosexuality, art, independence, and family. All around a quick, good read.
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LibraryThing member ReadersCandyb
This book was heart breaking and beautiful... It had a dark and lonely premise with slivers of lighted hope. The aura of the words clouded my every emotion and the tragic mystery had my imagination overwhelmed.

Marin always lived a life of solitude, but to her it was the norm. She entrusted her
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gramps decisions and never pushed for the unknown. Sadly though the unknown was her undoing... When death leaves her with unexpected answers and deep rooted loneliness, she runs to a new place and moles away in the solitude of never ending thoughts. A visit from her friend pulls her out of her burrow and together they navigate through the land mines of her emotions...

It was like a dark cloud hovering over a once clear blue sky. It was poetic and thought provoking, but also tragic and all consuming. It focused on grief, but also touched on self identifying and family turmoil. I found myself wrapped up in the pages and analyzing each and every sentence. I think so many will appreciate the words because they can be interpreted in so many different ways. It's a life lesson book with inspiration for all.
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LibraryThing member fred_mouse
This book is amazing. Heart breaking. Tear jerking (I cried for the last third. I'd just get over one bit, and there would be another one that would set me off)

After the event that underpins the whole book occurred, Marin walked away from her life, and went across country to start college with
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almost nothing. The book is set at the winter break of her first semester, when her best friend/ex-girlfriend comes across country to try and get her to come home.

This is a story about grief and grieving, about what it means to be family, and how a single event can derail your entire life. It is also a story about how family can look fine, but be horribly dysfunctional, and why it might be like that.
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LibraryThing member ainjel
This book is objectively a good novel, but I didn't like it. Maybe it's because I read it all in one go, maybe it's because I've read some incredible novels recently and this one fell flat in comparison. I know it's a good story, and I know it has most of the elements I like in a novel, but it came
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off as very.... meh. Nothing special here.

The cover is more beautiful than the plot.

I think my biggest issue with this book is I didn't care about any of the characters. They were all very boring, and flat, and kind of blended into each other. I felt like I was reading words on a page, rather than reading about people.

The plot is actually very nice, a bittersweet tale about love and grief and acceptance, and I found it very easily to run through. It kept me flipping pages, wanting to understand everything, to understand Marin's grief and loss, but it never packed a punch. I never felt sad.

So while it was good, it wasn't for me. I don't regret reading it, but it didn't leave me devastated and thus probably won't stick with me for long.
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LibraryThing member allison_s
A gorgeously written and bittersweet novel. A quick, cutting read about loss and moving on and maybe going back.

**Also always here for painfully good f/f make-out scenes. *clutches heart*

Longer RTC.
LibraryThing member elenaj
Warning: I cried a ton reading this book. It's a really lovely story, though, and wonderfully told.
LibraryThing member DrFuriosa
A beautifully written elegaic novel that deals with grief and identity. The story is simple but the writing elevates the content until you feel transported to the California coast and Marin's dorm room. Highly recommend.
LibraryThing member thereserose5
So beautifully melancholic that it swallows you whole.
LibraryThing member LibroLindsay
This was a gloriously melancholic read as well as a quick yet still enthralling one. It took me back to my own senior year of high school and first semester of college in a big way--in many ways, it was easy to identify with Marin's emotions. The emotional heft of this book did feel a bit more
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grounded that it often does in other YA, which I also appreciated. There were aspects surrounding the way mental illness was used in the book that didn't always sit well with me, but those issues seem minor when thinking of the book as a whole. I put off reading this for too long, but now I am really looking forward to reading more by LaCour.
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LibraryThing member mutantpudding
I started in writing a big long review for this book but then deleted it all because I stopped being able to distinguish between what the book was trying to make me feel and what was my own projected feelings (about the holidays, the west coast, winter, college, relationships, the loss of a
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grandparent, among other things). Most of the actual events in the book werent even directly relatable to me they just brought out a lot of feelings.

Basically this book is well written and I would recommend it as a emotional and engaging read even if I personally had a weird time with it.
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Language

Original language

English

Original publication date

2017-02-14

Physical description

8 inches

ISBN

0142422932 / 9780142422939
Page: 3.3893 seconds