Everything, Everything (Yoon)

Everything, Everything 
Nicola Yoon, 2015
Random House Children's
352 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780553496673


Summary
Now a major motion picture starring Amandla Stenberg as Maddy and Nick Robinson as Olly.

Risk everything . . . for love.

What if you couldn’t touch anything in the outside world? Never breathe in the fresh air, feel the sun warm your face…or kiss the boy next door?

In Everything, Everything, Maddy is a girl who’s literally allergic to the outside world, and Olly is the boy who moves in next door…and becomes the greatest risk she’s ever taken.

My disease is as rare as it is famous. Basically, I’m allergic to the world. I don’t leave my house, have not left my house in seventeen years. The only people I ever see are my mom and my nurse, Carla.

But then one day, a moving truck arrives next door. I look out my window, and I see him. He's tall, lean and wearing all black—black T-shirt, black jeans, black sneakers, and a black knit cap that covers his hair completely. He catches me looking and stares at me. I stare right back. His name is Olly.

Maybe we can’t predict the future, but we can predict some things. For example, I am certainly going to fall in love with Olly. It’s almost certainly going to be a disaster.

Everything, Everything will make you laugh, cry, and feel everything in between. It's an innovative,  inspiring, and heartbreakingly romantic debut novel that unfolds via vignettes, diary entries, illustrations, and more. (From the publisher.)

The novel was adapted to film in 2017 and stars Amandla Stenberg as Maddy and Nick Robinson as Olly.

Author Bio
• Birth—1972
• Where—Jamaica
• Raised—Jamaica; Brooklyn, New York City, New York, USA
• Education—M.F.A., Emerson College
• Currently—lives in Los Angeles, California


Nicola Yoon is the New York Times bestselling author of the young adult books Everything, Everything (2015) and The Sun Is Also a Star (2016). She grew up in Jamaica (the island) and Brooklyn (on Long Island).

Yoon's path to writing was a roundabout one. As a child, she loved to write, starting when she was 8 or 9, yet by high school, she'd become a math nerd, and in college she majored in electrical engineering. It wasn't until her senior college year, when she took a creative writing class, that she rediscovered her love of writing.

Nonetheless, Yoon went on to become a financial data programmer for investment firms. She worked in that field for several years and then decided to enroll in a creative writing program at Emerson College, where she earned an M.F.A. Still, she worked for another 20-some years—while writing on the side—before getting her first book deal.

That first book was Everything, Everything—a bestseller, a "best book of the year" on many lists, and a 2017 motion picture. Yoon says her inspiration came with the birth of her daughter after which she worried obsessively about her child's safety. Anything, she said, would make her frantic. Then she began to imagine a child whose life truly was threatened by the world, for ever, simply by being in it. How would an overly protective mother respond to those threats, and what shape would the mother-daughter relationship take?

That germ of an idea grew into Everything Everything, which was released in 2015. Yoon's husband, by the way, provided the artwork for the book. Her debut was followed by The Sun Is Also a Star in 2016, which has also been widely praised.

Yoon lives in Los Angeles, California, with her family. She’s also a hopeless romantic who firmly believes that you can fall in love in an instant and that it can last forever. (Adapted from the publisher and various online sources.)

Book Reviews
[G]orgeous and lyrical.… [W]ith offbeat, pragmatic and sweetly romantic characters and an unconventional narrative style—the text is punctuated with medical charts, kissing primers, and other illustrations from Yoon's husband, David Yoon—Everything, Everything tells us something we will always need to hear, no matter our age: that it's not the risks of love or heartbreak that might end us. It's the fear of the pain we might experience along the way that keeps us trapped in our cocoons—or our white, decontaminated houses.
Whitney Joiner - New York Times Book Review


It’s tempting to drop everything everything once you’ve begun…[and] hard not to be consumed by this tale of doomed love.
Times (UK)


Not only was I totally hooked…by the end I was totally blown away.
Arun Rath - NPR


A vibrant, thrilling, and, ultimately, wholly original tale that's bound to be an instant hit.
Bustle.com


The main conflict is resolved in a few brief pages and reflects an overall tendency for things to happen a bit too easily. Even so, this is an easy romance to get caught up in (Ages 12–up).
Publishers Weekly

Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to help start a discussion for Everything, Everything …then take off on your own:

1. How would you describe Maddy's character? Despite her drastic isolation, she seems incredibly well grounded. How do you account for that? Carla tells Maddy that "you're the strongest, bravest person I know." Do you agree? In what sense is Maddy brave?

2. How would you cope if you were in Maddy's situation? Or if you were a mother of a child with SCID?

3. At one point, Maddy tells her mother, "I am not lonely I am alone. Those things are different." What does she mean? And do agree with her distinction between alone and loneliness?

4. Talk about the role that technology plays in Maddy's life. How does it connect her to the outside? How does it connect her with Olly, and how does it allow their relationship to develop?

5. How is Olly different from Maddy in terms of personality? What draws him to Maddy? In what way do the two serve as foils for each other: in other words, how does one highlight (almost in opposition) the character traits of the other?

6. Risking for love is a major theme of this story. Is love worth risking everything for? What do you think? Nearly everyone in this book risks something—what does each risk? When is risk worthwhile, and when is it irresponsible ...and how you can know which it is?

7. What do you think of Carla and the actions she takes in the novel? At one point, she tells Maddy that "doomed love is a part of life." Do you think she is being glib...or wise here?

8. Finally, talk about Madeline's mother. Oh, boy. What do you predict for the future of their relationship? What would you like to see happen?

9. This book asks the question, can you love someone too much? If you do, is it love?

(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher.)

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