When You Were Everything by Ashley Woodfolk is not a story about falling in love, but about something important, and perhaps something not seen as much in young adult literature: the loss of friendship. Perhaps he doesn’t know how it feels…to break in this particular way. Or perhaps it’s different for boys? But girls cling to their friends for dear life as they wade through the rough waters of learning who they are while everything around and inside them is changing minute by minute. And aren’t we all a little bit in love with our best friends?”

I am pissed that I even entertain the idea of forgiveness for someone who had already given up on me, you know?” Bri wrote: "As always, a thoughtful and eloquent review <3 Putting this on my list to read very soon!" It happens the way these things do. Friends since age twelve, the girls start moving in different directions at the start of their sophomore year of high school. Layla wants more than anything to join the school chorus, and while the “Chorus Girls” adopt her right away, they have no interest in including Cleo in their elite circle. ALRIGHT, here we go. Am I well rested? No. Will this coffee work miracles? I hope so. Do I regret reading this book in nearly one sitting and foregoing sleep, thereby compromising my cognitive and intellectual abilities for likely the entire day today? No. My favorite fiction book of 2020 so far, thank goodness for the year of novels that focus on friendship! We Used to be Friends validated my heartbreak over the close friendships I lost in 2019, and When You Were Everything both validated that heartbreak and pushed me to believe in the power of opening my heart again despite past friendship pains. I feel grateful to Ashley Woodfolk for writing such a nuanced and realistic portrayal of friendship. As someone who has had quite a few intense friendships that either still exist today or have ended, I often feel unseen because fiction, including YA, focuses so much on romance. This book, however, gives voice to the type of close relationship that has both sustained me and hurt me throughout my life: best friendship.When You Were Everything is a heart wrenching story about mistakes, friendship, and loss. The friendships and loss which hits us harder than any other relationship. When someone was a part of you – a piece of your soul – and they begin drifting away, they break apart. I knew from the beginning that When You Were Everything was going to be emotional, but it’s also a love letter to the magic of New York City and to family.

When You Were Everything is the story of two teenagers who grow apart, who were everything to each other until they weren't. It's about the ugliness of being a teenager at high school with gossip-y bullies. It's about making new memories and finding new joy. It's about the pains of growing up and realising no one in your life is as perfect as you made them out to be in your head. This story has a lot of foreshadowing, macbeth references, quotes and ways of thinking that involve more than just friendships.The story of Cleo and Layla is not only heartbreaking but something inevitable that happens to millions of people. In her second novel, Ashley Woodfolk ( The Beauty That Remains) offers a powerful close-up view of what it means to lose a best friend and to feel like you’re facing the world alone.

Sydney shouts a monologue from William Shakespeare’s All’s Well That Ends Well in the middle of a cold, wintery park, creating a new memory for the park so Cleo is not overrun with memories of Layla. At this point, she thinks that maybe everything will be alright, but it’s not. I also would have liked Cleo’s relationship with her parents, particularly her mom, to be explored a bit more because we got a couple of glimpses of that, but nothing more detailed and I was really intrigued by what we did get! I really appreciate how this book breaks a linear timeline, as it is unclear when exactly “then” and “now” is actually referring. In this fresh take on a standard timeline, readers slowly get to know Cleo and Layla’s friendship, and their new friendships as they create new memories. Both characters did so many things wrong in this books. I started screaming at some of the things they did and I did not understand how it could have gone this far. Friend break ups are THE WORST. Honestly, I think they’re more painful than a romantic break up. And it’s not written about enough, and it should be. What topic is more relatable than a once close friend becoming a stranger? Who hasn’t been through that before in their lifetime?It's a satisfying coming-of-age friendship story, with Cleo learning to stop seeing people as all good or all bad, and that change can be exhilarating rather than disastrous." - Publishers Weekly (starred review) As a contemporary reader I have to say I love reading romance, but a book about friendship is something I love to read as well. Except these books tend to be harder to find. Recently I saw a booktuber talk about When You Were Everything and I knew I needed to read it. A friend of mine thought the same and we did a buddyread. I can tell you it was really worth it. If you want to find out more about this book and what I thought, keep on reading! Kristina Forestauthor of I Wanna Be Where You Areand Now That I’ve Found You WHEN YOU WERE EVERYTHING:

Acho que todo mundo tem um assunto em especifico que mexe com seus sentimentos e que faz te lembrar de alguma ferida antiga. Esse livro foi o que tocou nessa minha ferida. Friend breakups are HARD! Especially when it comes to the other person joining a friend group. Middle school, almost everyone is on the same level. Popular kids, nerds, band kids, etc… Those groups are just slowly rising. HighSchool is where the groups begin. Think about all the friends that you had and lost just because of the social standings of going into a group. (Also a group that Despises you). Right from the beginning, I just knew that would relate to this especially because of the changes Layla went through.While I know that Layla is lost to me, maybe this is her goodbye to our friendship the same way my story was mine. She sings the first line of my favorite song — the song that was playing the day we met — beautifully. She watched me and no one else.” (385) In LUX, the first book in afresh and relatablenew series, Ashley Woodfolkeffortlessly explores the complexities of fitting in, starting over and finding yourself, as well as your people. Young readers will most definitely want to join the FLYY Girls crew.” This book. I never knew a book could make you feel so vulnerable and so seen; a book that lays bare the messiness and hurt and pain in friendship breakups while also being incredibly empathetic and understanding. Reading this book was so incredibly worth it. I may have cried straight through the last half of it — that’s just how well-written and emotionally powerful it is. I absolutely recommend When You Were Everything to anyone looking for a sweet romance and a poignant tale of friendship, with all the ups and downs that come with any friendship that’s close to your heart. This is a must-read, and should be at the top of your to-read pile. I had never met anyone who…spoke the way that she did, and I thought that her speech might have been why she waited so long to speak to me. While I expected her to say ‘What’s wrong?’—a question I didn’t want to have to answer—she asked ‘What are you doing?’ instead, and I was glad.