Title: All Adults Here
Author: Emma Straub
Thoughts: Such a cute, feel-good book. I’ll echo some of the criticism this book has received and say that there are a lot of characters and the plot is…thin. But all the characters are so lovable that I didn’t even mind the lack of a substantive plot. They’re quirky, they’re relatable, they make mistakes, they feel fully human. All Adults Here is first and foremost a story of family—how complicated they can be, but how bound together by love they can be, too. Straub examines gender, sexuality, and the joys and pains of growing older through this lens. There’s so many words I want to use to describe this book: charming, heartwarming, simply delightful.
Favorite Lines:
“Astrid thought of her as human sunshine: bright, warm, sometimes harsh, but always good for one’s mood.” (p. 2)
“It wasn’t fair when people moved away—they took so much of you with them, without even meaning to.” (p. 162)
“While they were hugging, there could be no questions, only love.” (p. 170)
“The past was right there, if you wanted to look at it. The only trick was knowing that your past was never the same twice, and the past was never the same for two people.” (p. 229)
“Wendy thought that one’s actions should be driven by the future, which Elliot knew was a brand of optimism he did not possess. He knew that the only thing that really drove anyone—drove him—was the past.” (p. 276)
“Being an adult was like always growing new layers of skin, trying to fool yourself that the bones underneath were different too.” (p. 289)
“People said that everyone was born alone and everyone would die alone, but they were wrong. When someone was born, they brought so many people with them, generations of people zipped into the marrow of their tiny bones.” (p. 354)
