Everything Must Go

Everything Must Go is hilarilous and wholly original.

I can't believe how quickly I read this. It's quite a long book but today I steamed through more than half of it in one go to get to the end!

Love love love. Quare was such an interesting setting and I loved seeing it through Flora's eyes, so disparaging at first but then over time SHE becomes more 'Quare' herself.

I think I had a bit of a crush on Dean too.

The letters/emails/diary entries format was really well done too. It didn't simply read like a bunch of letters; as most of them were from Flora it felt like her narrative interspersed with a few things from others.

I loved the Legally Blonde-esque idea too of going to a school for a guy and then growing to realise that he's a jerk who's not worth it, but the choice in going to that school turned out to be the right one, if for originally the wrong reasons.

So not what I was expecting! At first glance, I didn't think I could like a story about a privileged girl in a school where they talk about social constructs, feminism, and the like but I really got into Flora's life. She was this smart rich girl that loved fashion and was infatuated with an older boy. She learned so much about herself that she moved beyond that image. Very unexpectedly lovely and some phenomenal writing.

Flora becomes a fashion icon when she meets this older boy who's tutoring her and happens to be popular online for his photography. ... An older boy taking pictures of a girl that's younger than him and highly impressionable... yeah if that isn't a bad sign for what's to come for Flora, I don't know what is... Anyways, she's so enamored by his charm that she decides it's a good idea to follow him to a new school she really doesn't know too much about because if she did, she would have never gone there. The boarding school is basically like living Amish, very progressive, independent, but not down with anything that makes Flora, Flora. Needless to say, she has a tough time fitting in and worse of all, Elijah, our charming photographer, never shows up. Ah, how she learns so much about Elijah and his ways. Oh, how I wanted to strangle that man child.

I enjoyed that the writing was comprised of emails, journal entries, letters, and website articles. It's not something you read everyday. Actually, nothing about this story was anything like I've ever read or have ever seen being marketed for YA before. There's something about this unique story that drew me in. The characters, Flora's conflicts, and the way Flora learned so much about herself or at least started to explore who she is surprised me. It's a very unexpectedly likable read. Honestly, I've been so tired of the same old thing in YA where the mysterious boy turns up and is the only one the MC can talk to and blah, blah, blah. Everything Must Go was funny and refreshing. It did end strangely but I felt like I went on a journey with Flora and that's kind of what you want when you read a book. This is Davis' first book so I'm expecting a lot more great reads from her in the future.