We Are All So Good At Smiling

 

From the Publisher:

They Both Die at the End meets The Bell Jar in this haunting, beautiful young adult novel-in-verse about clinical depression and healing from trauma, from National Book Award Finalist Amber McBride.

Whimsy is back in the hospital for treatment of clinical depression. When she meets a boy named Faerry, she recognizes they both have magic in the marrow of their bones. And when Faerry and his family move to the same street, the two start to realize that their lifelines may have twined and untwined many times before.

They are both terrified of the forest at the end of Marsh Creek Lane.

The Forest whispers to Whimsy. The Forest might hold the answers to the part of Faerry he feels is missing. They discover the Forest holds monsters, fairy tales, and pain that they have both been running from for 11 years.

My Review:

McBride's first book, another novel in verse, Me (Moth) was a definite 5-star book for me. It was also my 100th book of 100 in 2021. I love to end a big reading year in verse and this was a great way to end 2021. I said of Me (Moth) the verse was fire, the end broke my heart and the cover was just beautiful. 

For this book, We Are All So Good at Smiling, the cover, again, is exquisite, and McBrideʻs verse is still fire.  This book keeps with the fantasy/magic of Me (Moth). It still has depression and mental health as a key theme. This will speak to dark fantasy readers like my sister Becky whose favorite book is probably still Alice in Wonderland. 

Whimsy is both broken and strongly stubborn. Faery is a beautiful boy with flower tattoos peeking out of his clothes. I love the description:

Faerry rolls up his sleeves & floral tattoos/(honeysuckle, snapdragon & angelica/root)/bloom up his muscular arms.

I also love Whimsy's group therapy metaphor early on in the book when she says "I am jealous of leaves" and her explanation in the next poem about what she means. That stayed with me for days. I thought about it when I was writing a graduation message to my student teachers.

The problem I have with the book is that there was a little too much action for this genre of novel in verse. I almost wanted it to be a just a prose novel with the usual literary devices woven in. I found myself getting confused and had to borrow the audiobook to do a read along, so I really read this book 1 and a half times. The audiobook is read by the author, so it works out if you can provide both to readers.  

Suggestions for Curriculum & Classroom Use

Thematic currents:

• Depression
• Mental Health
• Familial Trauma
• Racial Stereotyping
• Grief, Loss of a Child/Sibling
• Friendship

Activity:

Catharsis Gardening: Using the idea of our own writing as catharsis for our inner fears and turmoils, students can draw, write, create their own stories of "getting through" as a way of getting out of Sorrow's Garden. This will take a lot of support, so make sure you have created a safe environment and have lots of backup ready. 

Heroes/heroines as humans: Looking at your own cultural mythology, in my case, native Hawaiian mythology, students look at the very human struggles of our heroes, like Maui, in my case. Just watch Disney's Moana. Students will actively seek out characteristics and incidences when our mythological heroes are also very human and battle the same kinds of emotions. This would be a character study into what makes someone a hero or heroine.

Save the Last Word for the Author: In this text, McBride leaves readers with both a narrator (interlude) as well as author's notes. She gets to tell her story and some of her intentions in sharing this story. For her, stories keep the world intact. That is the power of including author's notes, is that the reading transaction can also be with the author. Use this as a mentor text for when the students tell their own story. Encourage them to leave an author's notes of their own.

Publication Information:

Author: Amber McBride (also the narrator in the audiobook version)

Publisher: Macmillan Publishing Group (January 10, 2023)

Hardcover page count: 280