The Opposite of Loneliness

Some of the most memorable essays from this book include the one about the whale, the piece on consultants, and the very last one in the book. Some of theses I wish I had read years ago—especially as a student. There's a great comfort in having someone else use words to describe what you're feeling. The fictional stories are beautiful, emotional, and messy with many memorable moments and lines.

These aren't bad – it's just that it's not new to me; nothing surprised me or felt like it held insight, so it feels boring, which is a sin. A lot of it also felt predictable and I was uninterested in the characters which frequently felt like they were all the same character, even Marina Keegan herself.

I think it's also that my lens is warped and also that this is not Keegan's best representation. It's very much: here's a young woman who was going to shine so bright, but she didn't get a chance so we cobbled together everything she wrote that we could assemble. I graduated from college the same year as Keegan so it was very hard not to make comparisons.

I hate the whole, ‘well the sun is going to explode so everything is pointless'. We've got about five billion years before the sun become unstable, don't use that for an excuse if what you really want to say you think things are pointless or that humanity sucks, there are much more imminent and pressing things.

I was really disappointed in the essay – I dunno it read like a student paper article– about Yalies becoming consultants. Googled it, it's called “Even Artichokes Have Doubts”. It lacked heart, it didn't seem like she knew enough about her subject. I recently watched John Oliver's episode on McKinsey and oof, it's bad.

I refuse to give this less than two stars. I don't think it's fair that she wasn't able to give this the polish it deserved. I think that this collection really suffered a tone problem and the way it was organized. If Keegan herself were to have put published a collection herself, she would have done a better job of sorting, ordering, and introducing the fiction and non-fiction. I also went into this expecting a lot more non-fiction and I had a hard time caring about her fictional characters that seemed to have insecurity as their main character trait.

She had potential

While the writing was fantastic for a 22-year-old, and certainly better than my college creative writing, I felt the essays and stories couldn't escape that college perspective. I think I would have enjoyed and related to this much more had I read it senior year of college vs. 2 years after. Still some powerful moments and lovely sentiments, but would probably only recommend to college students. Still, it's wonderful her parents were able to publish this collection post-humous for her memory and talent to live on.