Grief is messy. It isn't a neat set of five stages you check off like a grocery list, and honestly, most books get it wrong. They make it look poetic and quiet. But in The Sky is Everywhere Jandy Nelson proved that losing someone you love is actually loud, frantic, and occasionally very embarrassing.
Lennie Walker is a disaster. Her sister, Bailey, just died. Suddenly, Lennie—the girl who was always content to stay in the shadows of her sister’s spotlight—is thrust into a world where the air feels too thin to breathe. She’s a band geek, a closet poet, and suddenly, she’s a girl vibrating with a strange, frantic energy that manifests in the worst possible way: a messy love triangle.
It's been years since this book first hit shelves in 2010, yet it remains a staple on "best of" lists. Why? Because Nelson writes like a jazz musician. The prose doesn't just sit there on the page; it leaps, stutters, and screams.
The Raw Mechanics of Lennie Walker’s Grief
Most people expect a book about a dead sibling to be a somber affair. You expect black veils and hushed whispers. Nelson flips that. She shows us the "grief-struck libido." That sounds weird, right? But it’s a real thing.
Lennie finds herself drawn to Toby, Bailey’s grieving boyfriend. They share a language of loss that no one else understands. It’s toxic, it’s uncomfortable, and it’s incredibly human. At the same time, Joe Fontaine arrives—a boy who "radiates music." He represents life. Lennie is stuck between the grave and the garden, and she’s making a total mess of both.
Nelson doesn't judge her. That’s the magic.
You’ve probably felt that "wrong" emotion at a funeral—the urge to laugh or the sudden, intense hunger for a cheeseburger. The Sky is Everywhere Jandy Nelson captures that specific cognitive dissonance. The book is punctuated by Lennie’s "scraps"—poems and thoughts scribbled on candy wrappers, napkins, and ripped pieces of paper that she leaves scattered across the town of Clover.
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These aren't just plot devices. They are the heartbeat of the novel.
Why the 2022 Film Adaptation Divided the Fandom
We have to talk about the Apple TV+ movie. Directed by Josephine Decker, it was a visual fever dream. Some fans loved the whimsical, magical realism—the way musical notes literally floated in the air or how the forest seemed to react to Lennie’s mood. Others? They felt it lost the grit of the book.
The film leaned heavily into the "indie quirk" aesthetic. While Decker is a brilliant director (look at Shirley or Madeline's Madeline), translating Nelson’s internal, hyper-stylized prose to the screen is like trying to catch lightning in a mason jar.
- The movie captured the color of the book.
- It missed some of the weight of the Uncle Big and Gram characters.
- Joe Fontaine's eyelashes were, predictably, a major talking point.
If you’ve only seen the movie, you’ve basically seen the watercolor version of an oil painting. The book is thicker. It’s heavier.
The "Nelson Style" and Why It Works
Jandy Nelson was a literary agent before she was a superstar author. She knows the "rules" of fiction, which is exactly why she’s so good at breaking them. In The Sky is Everywhere Jandy Nelson uses a style that many call "lyrical realism."
It’s not just that the sentences are pretty. It’s that they are sensory. You can smell the redwood trees. You can hear the struggle of a mediocre clarinet player trying to find the right note.
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The pacing is frantic. One minute you're laughing at Gram’s obsession with "man-wooing" roses, and the next, you’re hitting a wall of absolute, crushing sorrow. This isn't accidental. It mimics the bipolar nature of adolescence combined with trauma.
Navigating the Controversy of the Love Triangle
Let’s be real: the "cheating" aspect of the book makes some readers furious. Lennie is essentially cheating on the idea of Joe with the reality of Toby.
Is it "problematic"? Sure.
But literature isn't supposed to be a manual for perfect behavior. If Lennie made good choices, the book would be three pages long and incredibly boring. The conflict between Toby and Joe is a literal manifestation of Lennie's internal struggle:
- Toby = The Past. The pain. The connection to Bailey that can never be replicated.
- Joe = The Future. The possibility of joy. The terrifying prospect of moving on.
When you look at it through that lens, the "romance" becomes a metaphor for survival. It’s about a girl trying to figure out if she’s allowed to be happy while her sister is rotting in the ground. That’s heavy stuff for a "teen book."
Expert Take: The Role of Magical Realism in Contemporary YA
Dr. Jennifer M. Miskec, a scholar in children’s literature, has often pointed out how Nelson’s work fits into a specific niche of "high-intensity" YA. Nelson doesn't do subtle. In The Sky is Everywhere Jandy Nelson creates a world where the weather and the flora seem to empathize with the characters. This isn't just "whimsy"—it’s a way to externalize internal turmoil.
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Forgotten Details You Might Have Missed
The house. The Walker house is practically a character itself. It’s filled with Gram’s plants and Uncle Big’s various eccentricities. It’s a cocoon.
Lennie’s fear of "The Walker Curse" is another layer people often overlook. There’s this looming idea that the women in her family are destined for flight or disaster. Her mother, Paige, famously walked out years ago. Lennie isn't just grieving a sister; she’s grieving a mother who is alive but absent.
This creates a "double-grief" structure. Bailey’s death just ripped the scab off the old wound.
Actionable Steps for Readers and Writers
If you're picking up The Sky is Everywhere Jandy Nelson for the first time, or if you're a writer trying to emulate her success, here’s how to actually engage with this level of storytelling.
For the Reader:
Look past the romance. Seriously. It’s easy to get caught up in "Team Joe" vs. "Team Toby," but that’s the surface level. Instead, pay attention to the "scraps." Read the poems Lennie leaves behind. They tell a parallel story of her sanity returning in bits and pieces. Also, check out Nelson's second book, I'll Give You the Sun. It’s often considered the "spiritual successor" and deals with similar themes of art and sibling bonds but on an even more ambitious scale.
For the Writer:
Study Nelson's word choices. She uses "verbs of movement" in places where most writers use static descriptions. She doesn't just say a character is sad; she says the sadness "howls" or "stalks."
- Experiment with "found text" in your own writing.
- Don't be afraid to make your protagonist unlikable for a few chapters.
- Focus on the sensory details of a specific hobby (like Lennie’s music or Gram’s gardening) to ground the emotional stakes.
The Final Word on the Sky is Everywhere
This book isn't a "fun summer read," even though the cover often looks like one. It’s an autopsy of a broken heart. It reminds us that the sky is everywhere, which means there’s nowhere to hide from the truth—but it also means there’s plenty of room to finally catch your breath.
To fully appreciate the impact of Nelson's work, compare it to the more "hushed" grief found in books like The Thing About Jellyfish or the more cynical grief in The Catcher in the Rye. You'll find that Nelson occupies a unique middle ground where the pain is loud, colorful, and ultimately, hopeful.