Everything Beautiful in the World [Hardcover]

Lisa Levchuk (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 28, 2008

Lately I feel like an astronaut out on a space walk – constantly praying the tube attaching me to the ship doesn’t snap and send me flying into outer darkness.

 

The only good thing about having a mother with cancer is that people are willing to let you get away with pretty much anything. Like failing a Latin test. Or being late to class. Or skipping tennis practice. But there’s one thing Edna’s fairly certain even she can’t get away with – her burgeoning romance with Mr. Howland, her fourth-period Ceramics teacher. That day when Mr. Howland kissed her in his office, she felt like she was floating, like she could levitate right out of her skin. It’s Mr. Howland, with his tousled blond hair and his beautiful guitar and his spot-on impression of Dracula, who makes Edna feel happy for the first time in a long time. But what does Mr. Howland want? And how does Edna really feel – about her mother, about Mr. Howland, about moving forward?

Set in New Jersey in the 1980s, this is a piercing story about decisions both heart-wrenching and wonderful, and how life and love so often lead us down unexpected paths.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 9 Up—During a raging argument with her mother, Edna hears the phone ring. The news that her mother has cancer puts the fight and the 17-year-old's family life on hold. Mom disappears into Manhattan's Memorial Sloan Kettering Hospital and Edna's hardworking attorney father spends his evenings with his wife. The teen can't bring herself to go with him or even to talk with her mother on the phone. Emotionally numb, she is stuck at that moment when rage and terror intersect. The only person who seems to reach through her frozen state is her handsome and manipulative art teacher, Mr. Howland; his sexual advances make her feel good. Set in New Jersey in the 1980s, this first-person novel convincingly references the attitudes and popular culture of the era. For months, Edna avoids her mother. Instead, she focuses on the drama of her own secret affair, the breakup of Mr. Howland's marriage, and her unhappiness that her father seems absent in her life. Then, through annoying visits to a psychiatrist, she slowly begins to thaw. The fun with Mr. Howland is beginning to fade. On a field trip to New York, she impulsively ditches him and the rest of the class and ends up at her mother's bedside. It is a tough challenge to write from the viewpoint of a person who is not able to see the consequences of her actions or to identify the feelings she is desperately avoiding. This book begs for discussion.—Carolyn Lehman, Humboldt State University, Arcata, CA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

*Starred Review* Seventeen-year-old Edna is in the midst of having a fight with her mother when a telephone call forces her mother to say, “All fights postponed.” She has been told she has cancer. So begins an interesting experiment in writing that gives this book a quite different sound from so many YA novels with their ubiquitous first-person voice. In a flat tone that’s much more reportage than confessional, Edna relates how an affair begins with her art teacher, Mr. Howland, while her mother is in the hospital. Making it clear she will not visit her mother, and ignoring a father who ignores her, Edna is given a “free pass” to do what she wants. And what she wants is to live in the cocoon that surrounds her and Mr. Howland, eating lunches in seclusion, going to their secret spot for sex. Although this story has been done before, it is the way Levchuk writes it that is both startling and affecting. Reminiscent of Brock Cole’s remote style in The Facts Speak for Themselves (1997), this technique allows readers to get farther inside Edna’s head than she is herself. We see, more clearly than she does, how Mr. Howland can annoy her and how his neediness scares her. Her questions about a long-dead brother reveal more about her than she would be comfortable with anyone knowing. There are some flaws. Although the book is set in the 1980s, Edna’s mother’s long hospital stay seems necessary to accommodate the plot rather than her illness, and the end seems rushed. But, overall, Levchuk does a remarkable job of writing a novel that offers the facts on the pages; all the emotion is underneath. Grades 9-12. --Ilene Cooper

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 14 and up
  
• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR); 1st edition (October 28, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374322384
• ISBN-13: 978-0374322380
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,521,750 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful Debut, January 1, 2009

By 

Little Willow (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Everything Beautiful in the World (Hardcover)

If you combined the family strain and personal search from The Pursuit of Happiness by Tara Altebrando with the forbidden teacher-student relationship from Teach Me by R.A. Nelson and added a pinch of the melancholy from Lisa, Bright and Dark, by John Neufeld, you would get Everything Beautiful in the World, a stunning debut from Lisa Levchuk.

Set in New Jersey in 1980, the story is that of seventeen-year-old Edna, an only child whose mother has recently been diagnosed with cancer and hospitalized in New York City. Edna can't (or won't) visit her mother, with whom she fought shortly before the diagnosis was revealed. She can't get that unfinished fight out of her head and feels guilty, as though her words caused the illness. As Edna pulls away from her father, she falls for her sculpture teacher, a married man in his early thirties who "sees beauty in things that other people take for granted," including her. Edna keeps their developing relationship a secret as she continues her day-to-day routine, attending school and working at a pharmacy where she occasionally steals objects and works for a middle-aged man who thinks he looks like Elvis Presley.

Though Edna is initially consumed by her relationship with Mr. Howland, the story becomes more layered as time goes on, especially with revelations related to her family's past. Her parents insist that she begin seeing a therapist, so she does, but she still can't manage to visit her mother. In one memorable scene, she and her father set out for the hospital, but Edna gets physically ill to the point that they must make multiple stops, then ultimately turn around and head home.

Told in vignettes titled after the locations or goings-on ("Another Night at the Pharmacy," "A Party at Patty's House"), with realistic references to the time period (the music of Bruce Springsteen, the aftermath of the Vietnam War), this coming-of-age story will appeal to fans of Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson as well as those who lived through the actual era and/or read young adult fiction written in the eighties.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars An interesting debut!, July 9, 2009

By 

Sarah Woodard (Bremerton, WA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Everything Beautiful in the World (Hardcover)

Edna's mother has cancer, and most people are willing to let her get away with anything. For example, she can fail a Latin test, be late to class, and skip tennis practice. There is one thing that Edna is fairly certain that she can't get away with... dating her teacher. Yet, Mr. Howland is so perfect or well she thinks so. He has long tousled blond hair, great skills on the guitar, and can do a great impression of Dracula. Edna is happy for the first time in a while. Every time, she kissed him, she feels like she is floating. Suddenly more people know and it gets complicated. Edna doesn't know if it can last much longer.
Edna was a wonderful character. She did somethings that she later regrets, but what teen hasn't that happened too. She was very caring. Like wondering what happened to her brother, Tommy and also with her mom. I felt bad that she thought it was her fault. Mr. Howland was a selfish man and a jerk. I don't understand what Edna saw in him. Also, why didn't Barbie and Patty tell on him? It really annoyed me. The plot was pretty good. It wasn't predictable. The writing was fantastic and I can't wait for more from Levechuk.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Strong characters make for a terrific read, November 3, 2008

By 

Elizabeth Penmanship "Beth" (Washington, DC United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Everything Beautiful in the World (Hardcover)

Loved this book! I'm not sure why it is classified as "young adult" - although the story is focused on a young girl, it is certainly not juvenile. The characters, especially Edna, are extremely relatable and the plot is gripping. I've recommended this book to be the next selection for my book club. Thoroughly enjoyable from the first page to the last for anyone who is now or has ever been a teenager.