If you could read my mind, you wouldn't be smiling.
Samantha McAllister looks just like the rest of the popular girls in her junior class. But hidden beneath the straightened hair and expertly applied makeup is a secret that her friends would never understand: Sam has Purely-Obsessional OCD and is consumed by a stream of dark thoughts and worries that she can't turn off.
Second-guessing every move, thought, and word makes daily life a struggle, and it doesn't help that her lifelong friends will turn toxic at the first sign of a wrong outfit, wrong lunch, or wrong crush. Yet Sam knows she'd be truly crazy to leave the protection of the most popular girls in school. So when Sam meets Caroline, she has to keep her new friend with a refreshing sense of humor and no style a secret, right up there with Sam's weekly visits to her psychiatrist.
Caroline introduces Sam to Poet's Corner, a hidden room and a tight-knit group of misfits who have been ignored by the school at large. Sam is drawn to them immediately, especially a guitar-playing guy with a talent for verse, and starts to discover a whole new side of herself. Slowly, she begins to feel more "normal" than she ever has as part of the popular crowd . . . until she finds a new reason to question her sanity and all she holds dear.
My Thoughts
Every Last Word is about mental illness and popularity. Sam is one of those popular “Mean Girls” girls in school. She and her friends seem to be having the high school days of their lives. Even though Sam belongs to the clique, she’s uncomfortable with what they’re doing to other people, like mocking them or ostracizing them, but she’s scared she’ll lose her friends if she ever objects to their actions. However our lovely protagonist Sam has a secret. She has Purely-Obsessive OCD and has been seeing a therapist for a long time. She can’t turn off a thought and often latches on to something obsessively. Speaking of OCD, I must say I’m genuinely saddened by the misuse of the term. It’s a legitimate and harrowing illness, not something to boast of when you don’t even have it. We should really reconsider our choice of words when we say we’re OCD about something.“I’m going to show you something that will change your whole life.”
Things grows brighter for Sam when she meets a new friend, Caroline, who’s one of those girls who don’t care if they’re not popular, and she introduces Sam to the Poet’s Corner, a hidden place where students write poetry and glue them to the walls. The Poet’s Corner is covered all over with scraps of paper with poems written on them, and people take turn reading their works on a small stage. Enchanted by this secret club, Sam worms her way into the group, fighting her thoughts and anxiety along the way. When she can’t sleep, she scribbles poetry in her notebooks all night long, filling the pages with her words and thoughts. With this new outlet for her obsessive nature, Sam finally begins to feel normal.
She earns my love by apologizing to AJ, a boy she and her friends use to bully because of his stuttering. The book sort of glosses over the bullying part, but it’s nice to see the author at least addressing the issue. AJ is yet another endearing character I’m thankful for. He’s not one of those moody jerks but is caring, forgiving, and just sweet. Sam finds full support in AJ after she confesses her disorder to him. We really need more of those male characters!
The book also captures how a toxic friendship can eat at a person. The girls in Sam’s clique are not her real friends who she can talk to about her illness and the dark thoughts plaguing her 24/7 but vicious girls who add to her worries and stress and who can throw her to the wolves. They even have a freaking hierarchy! I mean, what sick kind of friend group does that? In one part of the book, the clique leader is forced to choose two of her “best friends” to take to the special spa on her birthday, and Sam’s not one of them. Almost every exchange between Sam and her clique makes me want to punch the mean girls in their catty faces (purely metaphorical. I’d never resort to violence). This is why I’m so wary of female group friendship; it just needs too much wile and wits to understand the subtle dynamics.
The ending of the book came as a huge surprise, so I won’t spoil it for you here. Overall Every Last Word is not revolutionary or breathtaking, but it’s a warm tale of overcoming a mental handicap to enjoy life freely.
