By Rating: 4/5 stars
Favorite quote: “Just because you can’t experience everything doesn’t mean you shouldn’t experience anything.”
Madeline is 18 years old and has never left her house (makes quarantine seem okay, doesn’t it?). She suffers from a form of Severe Combined Immunodeficiency; in other words, she’s allergic to everything. She is homeschooled and spends all her time reading and hanging out with her mom, who’s a doctor, and her nurse, Carla. When a new family moves into the house next door, Maddy sees Olly through the window. He is the same age, and she is instantly attracted to him. They start IMing and emailing one another, and Maddy realizes that she is in love with Olly. But how can they be together when Maddy can’t even go outside? (Why does there have to be a doomed love story in every single YA novel ever published? I’m not sure)
There is a huge twist at the end of the book, but unfortunately it got spoiled for me. I feel like I would have liked it more if I hadn’t known the twist. I still enjoyed the book, though, and it was a super fast read (I read it in one afternoon). It definitely suffered from instalove, but since she has been around barely anyone except for her mother all her life, it made sense that Maddy would fall for the first boy she met. My favorite part was the writing; this book has gorgeous writing, and Nicola Yoon included little snippets, like sticky notes written by characters and screenshots of Maddy’s email inbox, interspersed throughout the book. I thought that was really clever and creative. And because Maddy is an avid reader, Everything, Everything is one of those books that references other books, which I really like. The problem is that it crossed the line into one of my pet peeves, which is when books reference other books and spoil them in the process. Maddy likes to write one-sentence “spoiler alert” book reviews, and she really does spoil a lot of the books mentioned, which annoyed me a little. Overall, Everything, Everything is a pretty light, quick, and satisfying, albeit predictable read.
Frappes and Fiction 