The Opposite of Loneliness by Marina Keegan | Rating: ★★★★☆

“We’re so young. We’re so young. We’re twenty-two years old. We have so much time. There’s this sentiment I sometimes sense, creeping in our collective conscious as we lie alone after a party, or pack up our books when we give in and go out - that it is somehow too late. That others are somehow ahead. More accomplished, more specialized. More on the path to somehow saving the world, somehow creating or inventing or improving. That it’s too late now to BEGIN a beginning and we must settle for continuance, for commencement.”

I wanted to write more for my review for this, but nothing seemed quite appropriate; not good enough for what I wanted to say about this beautiful book. Therefore, my thoughts will be rather quick and to the point when it comes down to it. I cannot stress enough that this collection of work is something you need to read in order to form an opinion on it.
The Opposite of Loneliness is a series of essays and short stories written by the late Marina Keegan; a young woman who had recently graduated from Yale and, like most 22 year old women, had a promising future. As you’ve heard by now, within the buzz surrounding this publication, just days after her graduation, Marina was killed in a car accident. Just like that, an entire and bright future was wiped out and the world lost a potential literary star.

It’s moments like this that remind us how fragile life truly is and how quickly something can be taken away from us all. Marina, like many young people, has something in her writing that projected the idea that we all find ourselves feeling invincible. Even still, her tone was mature and realistic; bringing us the knowledge that although there’s still so much more to explore, she had a great understanding of the world around her.


Marina Keegan’s voice was bright and full of potential; her writing rich and something that would have taken her further had she lived. She had the makings of a star in literature, if only she had been able to craft her work for far longer than she did.

Her writing is deserving of the hype and the tragedy of it all is seeing just how much it could have improved if she’d survived the accident and continued her craft. Marina’s introduction is the biggest highlight of each work present; it is raw and beautiful and so very thoughtful.

The Opposite of Loneliness is her legacy — and while some of the works within were hits and others misses, it’s incredibly devastating knowing that we will never see her at her full potential. There is a great possibility that we’d have never known who she was had she not died just as there is a possibility that we would have. I didn’t pick up this novel because of the death of our author, but because of the promising tone in which she’d wrote with at her age.

Wise beyond her years, but still a work in progress, Marina had certainly created a path of greatness that was cut short. And The Opposite of Loneliness showcased this talent; her warm writing and thoughtful nature, giving us each something to truly think about by novels end.

Thank you, Marina Keegan. Your light will never truly go out.