We Are All So Good at Smiling

Ages 14 to 17

They Both Die at the End meets The Bell Jar in this haunting, beautiful YA 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 that 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 eleven years.

About the Author

Amber McBride estimates she reads about a hundred books a year. Her work has been published in literary magazines, including Ploughshares and Provincetown Arts. Her debut young adult novel Me (Moth) was a finalist for the National Book Award and won the 2022 Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe Award for New Talent, among many other accolades. She is a professor of creative writing at the University of Virginia and lives in Charlottesville, Virgina.