This book was such a rich and delightful reading experience. The writing style is a notable asset to the book, making the story vivid, visceral in experience, and full bodied. Despite the heavy subject matter, the book was a fast paced and impactful story, forgoing the need for processing because the writing style allowed the story to settle in with comfort. Gorgeous!!

I enjoyed this book even with covering such a hard topic of clinical depression. The author presents the topic in a relatable context to teens and young adults who may be experiencing sorrow, loss and trauma. The writing is wonderfully descriptive and not superfluous. By using fairy tale characters that we are all familiar with, readers can easily envision what the main character, Whimsy, is experiencing. She and her new friend Faerie go on a "journey" to connect with their grief and find a way to resolve their mental health and find their new normal. I feel this is a book that most teens should read. I will definitely be giving a copy to my 18 year old and recommending it to all my parent friends.

This is a novel written in verse that address grief, trauma and healing in abstraction.

I really enjoyed this book. I can see myself reading it again, and again.

It is not a perfect book. I was particularly frustrated by the index. It felt unnecessary and I honestly wish I had skipped past it. The index serves to explain something that I wish I had been given the choice to interpret on my own. There are also moments when the abstraction is too abstract? The metaphors get lost within themselves, which would be fine if the reader wasn't also in the dark at the moment about Whimsy's trauma.

I do wonder if my opinion about how abstract it is will change after my second read. It is very possible that I may read it and realize that I simply glossed over details and this second time around I am open to understanding them.

I do recommend this book, just go in with an open mind, or -once it exist- consider listening to the audiobook version.

Metaphorically beautiful verse!
Two depressed teens, Whimsy and Faerry, meet at a mental hospital and then become neighbors and attend high school together. They’re both suffering from depression and memory loss from when they were young children. They’re not sure what they’re not remembering but it’s bothering both of them to the point of despair. They become friends that want to help each other and understand each other’s problems. They need each other to process the trauma they’ve been through and to help the lost information resurface.

Likes/dislikes: The writing is metaphorical and beautiful. I was intrigued by the mystery surrounding the story. I like Whimsy and Faerry, the two main characters.
Language: G for no swears and no f-bombs.
Mature Content: PG for suicidal thoughts (nondescriptive) and clinical depression.
Violence: PG for talk of cutting, undescribed.
Ethnicity: The two main characters are black and they attend a predominantly white school.

<i>Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with an e-ARC and finished copy in exchange for an honest review.</i>

3.5 stars.

This was a beautiful, ambitious novel in verse about trauma, healing, and memory. Following our main character Whimsy, this certainly is a whimsical novel, although hauntingly so. It relies heavily on magical realism and fairy tale. I appreciated its vibrancy and pain, although I did feel like it veered off a bit too far into the abstract sometimes. We really don’t get much information about what happened besides something terrible until the end, which is fine as it relates to Whimsy’s trauma, but the heavy imagery combined with the lack of knowledge on the reader’s part made it difficult for me to focus. But still, I enjoyed this and thought the writing was strong.

A side note on a thought I had and just remembered after talking with a friend: I thought the appendix was unnecessary. It is quite literally just an explanation of every single metaphor in the book—and it’s detailed to the point where it almost undermines the reader’s ability to 1) understand the text and 2) interpret it their own way. The beauty of abstract books is that there are many things you can take from it, even if they diverge from the author’s intentions. But instead, the appendix tries to unravel the author’s creativity, without letting the reader come to that conclusion. I suppose if you were lost in the book, then maybe the appendix is helpful, but also, if the reader is that lost, perhaps that’s not on the reader.

Delivered in a magnificent thread of verse, We Are All So Good At Smiling by Amber McBride offers a message of hope found in a forest full of secrets and monsters. Whimsy is a teenage girl receiving treatment in a mental hospital when she meets a boy named Faerry. Both of them realize they are magical beings battling secrets from a shared past they are unable to fully remember.

3.75 stars
Thank you to Netgalley, Amber McBride, and everyone apart of the FierceReads team for this e-arc to read and review.

Written in verse, WE ARE ALL SO GOOD AT SMILING, follows Whimsy, a teenager with clinical depression caused by traumas from her past that she seems to remember differently from everyone around her. While she's at a treatment center, she meets Faerry, a boy with wings, garden tattoos, and someone she recognizes to have the same magic as her. When she leaves the center, he's not far behind.... as her new neighbor and sharing the same fears of the Forest. As they spend more time together, Whimsy and Faerry discover their lives are more interconnected than they originally thought and reopen old wounds to heal. Told with fairy tale references and magical elements, this story beautifully and emotionally details the affects mental health, trauma, and death has on teens and how they cope.

What a unique book! I enjoyed the creative exploration of depression. Novels in verse are in high demand. We will definitely purchase, but it will take a sophisticated teen reader to appreciate this one. Love this Amber McBride’s writing.

A beautifully crafted blend of the whimsical and the painfully all-too-real. Airy and rooted at once, this novel in verse picks its way delicately through a tale of trauma, grief, friendship, courage, the heaviness of depression and the magic of storytelling. It overexplains its own metaphors a bit too much for me, but it's still a visceral and affecting exploration of these characters and these feelings.

Thank you to the publisher for the advance review copy.

Trigger warnings: Clinical depression, hospitalization, self-harm, suicide ideation & discussion, sibling death, racism/racist bullying.

Like 'Me (Moth),' this is a gorgeously-written novel-in-verse, although this one deals with depression to an even greater degree than McBride's debut did. It's still deeply interested in seeing beyond the 'real' as defined by contemporary society, and I love the way McBride blends the real with the magical/spiritual/surreal.

I wish I had had this book to read when I was in high school because I think it would have spoken to me so strongly back then! Amber McBride has such a lyrical writing style and uses fairy tale motifs that I was very drawn to at the time. I really think young adult readers are going to love this!

Part of the pleasure of reading this book comes in figuring out what is going on - we are learning about Whimsy and Faerry's magic, Whimsy is missing memories about a traumatic event in her past, there is a haunted Forest she is scared to go into, and more details unfold as the book goes on. I found a lot to relate from this book to the way that I felt sadness/depression as a teenager. Whimsy at one point says, "The sadness / opens like a fault like / in the earth & I fall in every time" (76), which is almost exactly how I would have described my own feelings in high school.

As an adult reader, I did find the use of the Forest as a metaphor for Whimsy's (and Faerry's) depression to be a tad heavy-handed and repetitive, especially with the appendix at the back of the book explaining it to the reader. I much prefer to be left to draw connections on my own - focusing too much on the metaphor sometimes detracts from the haunting and beautiful aspects of the magical world developed here. This makes the story run closer to cliche than I would have liked, with Whimsy repeating multiple times, "The only way out is through."

If you like YA about fairy tales or mental health, with magic and really lyrical writing, I would highly recommend this!

This is a gorgeous book told in verse. It is instantly engaging and weaves a story and casts a spell on its readers. The story is of a girl and a boy and the secrets they share and the monsters they must vanquish to heal themselves. It is a story of depression and mental illness, a story of loss and healing. It is spellbinding.

This is an odd and sometimes disquieting book. Some people will love it; they will see themselves and their problems and know that someone understands. Other people will dislike it intensely, for the same reasons. Written in blank verse, We Are All So Good as Smiling walks the reader through the characters' joint losses with a combination of fairy tales from around the world and the magic that the characters themselves and their families possess. Recommended for high school and up, and especially for those who think that no one understands.

We Are All So Good at Smiling was absolutely fantastical! McBride wrote a story that was so well written I found myself flying through the pages, unable to put the book down, pondering what would happen next. My favorite piece of this entire story was how believable the characters were.

The writing is clear and clean, and very immersive. The book hums along at a good clip, but the pacing makes sure we're given time to breathe between plot-intensifying moments. The story was absolutely engaging and the work that went into the settings was noticeable and superb. I felt absolutely transported and I'm so incredibly glad I was able to read an arc of this story.

Thank you to the published and NetGalley for this ARC! This book in verse truly blew me out of the water: with fantasy elements and an insightful commentary on mental illness, McBride was able to create a tale of adventure with real world commentary. McBride's narration through Whimsy, a conjurer who is suffering from depression, was so well done, crafting a character with a one-of-a-kind voice and relatable tone. McBride's symbolic representation of depression and anxiety was absolutely incredible, and I could not put this book down once I started it. Would 100% percent recommend to readers of poetry and realistic fantasy.

I loved this book. Amber McBride’s writing in verse is beautiful, atmospheric and absolutely transporting. This book does an excellent job of depicting mental health and especially mental health issues in teenagers. I love how depression/mental illness was personified and depicted as an outside source. I think this perfectly combats the prevalent mentality that depression is a choice, “you should smile more”, “just cheer up”, etc. I love how McBride wove fairytales, Hoodoo, and magical realism into the story. This really took Faery and Whimsy’s journey through sorrow and depression to a new level. By exiting the everyday world this story was able to thoroughly depict the true depth of depression in a way no other book I’ve ever read has. The support Faery and Whimsy show each other is beautiful and inspiring. While this book does address many triggering topics, I think the relationship between Faery and Whimsy could serve as a light for so many people. Outside of mental health issues, this book tackles toxic masculinity, racism and family dynamics. At its core this book addresses the importance of discussing mental health openly and the damage that can come from being dishonest or sweeping things under the rug. I cannot stress enough how much I loved this book. Between being written in gorgeous, lyrical verse, including such unique, magical fairytale elements, and so perfectly addressing depression and mental health I can see myself coming back to this book over and over again.

Now y’all know novels in verse are not my jam. This was actually hard for me to get through as well. I had no way of knowing how deeply this was going to end up touching me by the end. It was well worth the read.

Now the reason I don’t like novels in verse, is because they usually have so much imagery and double meanings and all the other things. And with my ADHD and me always having to do something else while I’m listening to a book and having it on super speed lol I sometimes miss a lot. Novels in verse force me to slow down, and that’s just what this book did. Now the writing style and the fantasy elements also had me stuck there too. Like this book was so lyrical and beautiful! I didn’t catch all the symbolism, but for what I did, I thought it was amazing.

Please be kind to yourself regarding this book tho. It depicts self-harm and suicide ideation/attempt. Please don’t read if this is something that can cause you to spiral. With that being said, this book took me through the ringer. I was in tears as soon as I figured out what was going on. It wasn’t that it was sad, it was more so that I hated that Whimsy felt that there was no way out. I hated that she felt so alone.

Then there’s the plot. This is where it gets tricky for me. Like I said, I’m not a novel in verse fan, so me not understanding what this was trying to say was probably a me problem, not a book problem, so I won’t say I didn’t enjoy it. The way this is told is so haunting and yet beautiful at the same time. I loved it. But what I got from it, is during her time there at the hospital for treatment, she’s beginning to come out of her depression, with the help of her new friend, Faerry. I do believe that he was in her mind, but that could be for you, the next reader, to decide. This is why they’re so hard for me. They have so much that is left out, and I have to make my own interpretation or get what they want me to get out of it. However, that’s not good for me. I find myself wondering if I guessed right on things all the time. I have Pure O OCD and let me tell you, I have a hard time letting random questions like that go.

This book was very much out of my wheelhouse, but with its amazing writing and the haunting words used to tell the story, this book touched me like I didn’t think it would. If there’s any books at all that have surprised me, it’s this one. A novel in verse about a teen who needs help? Doesn’t sound like me, but it worked oh so well!

From my blog post: First, I have to say that the cover is stunning and it fully deserves its flowers (or rather butterflies, lol). Getting that out of the way, this was such a beautifully written novel in verse that balanced out the whimsical (*smirks*) with contemporary so well and it definitely felt like a fairy-tale (*smirks again*) while I was reading. We see the MCs navigate a world where they have to navigate connection to themselves, each other, their families and the secrets that threaten their lives as they know it. They also face what it is to face grief, anxiety and depression head on, which I can deeply relate to. The imagery throughout the story is breathtaking and brings to life different mythologies that we know and love. I’d highly recommend grabbing your favorite comfy blanket/hoodie & cup of tea to enjoy while reading this book.

A refreshingly honest look at mental health and grief all wrapped up in a lyrical little package.

I really enjoyed how frank this book is. McBride pulls no punches when describing the realities of mental health struggles - everything from spiraling to recovery to what it's like dealing with the medical system. So much of this story centers around what it happening inside someone's head and I deeply respect and value how genuinely it's all represented.

While I enjoyed the fairy tale elements in this story (especially how many various lore origins the author draws from) I did struggle with some of the more magical elements in the story. It occassionally felt difficult to grasp what was really going on and how things were connected. It all came together really beautifully in the end, but there was a section during around 60%-80% that felt muddled and challenging to grasp.

McBride's writing style is as stunning as ever. This story really lends itself to be incredibly atmospheric and she absolutely delivers on that. Top notch descriptions that really anchor the reader in the story.

I loved McBride's debut and I really enjoyed this book as well. I will always highly anticipate whatever she does next.

Special thanks to NetGalley and Feiwel & Friends for an ARC in exchange for honest review.

A splendid own voices YA that was written in verse. A dark, whimsical fairytale that tackles topics like trauma, depression, self harm and more (please check trigger warnings). Overall, this is a beautifully written book, but for me it felt slow and very abstract. I can see this being a very popular book for others and see the potential.