Reviews
Rosoff writes with startling acuity about a young person’s search for self and for meaningful connection… this anguished story is sure to attract a crossover audience of older teens, as well as adults, who will appreciate Rosoff’s questions about the nature of time, memory, and the events that become, over a life’s arc, the defining moments.” —Booklist, Starred Review An extraordinary account of an obsessive friendship between a prep-school misfit and a beautiful orphan.” —Kirkus, Starred Review This is a richly patterned work about secrets, what the tide hides and reveals and how an innocent crush can utterly change everything.” —People, 4 Stars There is magic, power and mystery in the novel, without anyone ever waving a wand.” —San Francisco Chronicle This whole novel is built on a surprise (which caught me totally unaware), but beyond the surprise lies the beauty of what it means to live without junk in your life, only essential beauty, together with the reminder that all of it—the junk and the beauty—will be gone in a twinkling. This is a lovely book.” —Washington Post What I Wasshows us a more confident author whose poetry lies in her elegant, straightforward descriptions of human activity—cooking crabs, climbing a chalk cliff, learning to sail—instead of lurid embellishment. The result is a beautifully crafted tale that seems, like its protagonist, both enduringly old and fluently new.” —Los Angeles Times (Rosoff’s) portrayal of adolescent awakening is intimate and thoroughly persuasive.” —Boston Globe, “Rosoff writes with startling acuity about a young person’s search for self and for meaningful connection& this anguished story is sure to attract a crossover audience of older teens, as well as adults, who will appreciate Rosoff’s questions about the nature of time, memory, and the events that become, over a life’s arc, the defining moments.â€� — Booklist , Starred Review “An extraordinary account of an obsessive friendship between a prep-school misfit and a beautiful orphan.â€� — Kirkus , Starred Review “This is a richly patterned work about secrets, what the tide hides and reveals and how an innocent crush can utterly change everything.â€� — People , 4 Stars “There is magic, power and mystery in the novel, without anyone ever waving a wand.â€� — San Francisco Chronicle “This whole novel is built on a surprise (which caught me totally unaware), but beyond the surprise lies the beauty of what it means to live without junk in your life, only essential beauty, together with the reminder that all of it—the junk and the beauty—will be gone in a twinkling. This is a lovely book.â€� — Washington Post “ What I Was shows us a more confident author whose poetry lies in her elegant, straightforward descriptions of human activity—cooking crabs, climbing a chalk cliff, learning to sail—instead of lurid embellishment. The result is a beautifully crafted tale that seems, like its protagonist, both enduringly old and fluently new.â€� — Los Angeles Times “(Rosoff’s) portrayal of adolescent awakening is intimate and thoroughly persuasive.â€� — Boston Globe
