We are okay Book review

                                 We are okay book review

We are okay is a book by Nina Lacour. In this book, something tragic happens to the main character, Marin, and not being ready to forgive, she tries to forget. She leaves for college, planning to never look back. Calls and voicemails sent to her phone never got an answer and the friend she leaves behind never heard a good bye. However, now in the midst of her winter break, her friend Mabel is coming to visit her college for three days and upon arrival, Mabel tells her upfront that she wants her to come home. With no longer any known immediate family left of Marin’s, Mabel tells Marin that her parents are willing to take her in. However, Marin says no. Although she wants to say yes, she can not face going back you California. Mabel, rather intent on her mission continues to stay for the next three days as Mabel and her do things together like visit Mabel’s favortie shop and stay in the mostly empty dorm, while they get to know the new versions of each other. Meanwhile, Marin talks about her past on the sunny shores of California and how she ended up in New York, not willing to go back. Mabel talks about how, with her mother dead, and her father missing, she lived with her fairly quirky grandfather who gave her random lectures and could be a rather private person. She also mentions that although she was brought up rather unconventionally, she was happy. In addition, she talks about how she and Mabel grew up together. She mentions how they first met and became friends, to when they went to parties, and their budding romance before mentioning the thing which drove them apart.

I thought this book was fairly interesting, and I really liked how there was a twist. I also like how she switched perspectives from beginning to end. The book of my last book review, Deadfall, also did this. I find that I like this method a lot because its like your getting two stories for one and I always find myself wondering how these two different plots will connect. Although this method can annoy me at times, because I find that books which do this often will come to a really interesting part for the present or past and then switch to the other perspective until you come to a really suspenseful part and then it switches to the original. However, I will admit that this can be rather useful in building suspense and effective in making sure I do not put that book down for a while. For the most part, I liked the characters. The book really focused on Marin so she was the only one which I could really judge and as a character she wasn’t bad. She really just felt like a rather normal person who was going through some tough times, and I think that  really allows the reader to connect and sympathize. I also thought the writing flowed really nicely and that it was quite nice to read. However, I did think that the novel felt a little short and that there was not much to say in the present so that part felt rather bland, especially compared to what she had to say in the past. However, overall, the book kind of kept my interest, so I would give it a 7/10 stars.

-Annie Bilderback