What If It's Us by Becky Albertalli
Published 2018 · 123,200 words · about 6 hours at an average pace · Young Adult, Romance, LGBTQ+ Fiction
How hard is What If It's Us to read?
What If It's Us scores 26 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it relatively accessible. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 22 out of 100
- Albertalli and Silvera use plain contemporary teen speech full of texting slang and musical-theater references. It sits close to Beach Read in accessibility.
- Sentence structure: 24 out of 100
- Short, conversational sentences and quick dialogue carry the two alternating voices. Syntax is as direct as in Beach Read.
- Abstraction: 28 out of 100
- The story stays with concrete dates, texts and city streets. Questions of fate versus choice arise through events, as in It Ends with Us.
- Information density: 26 out of 100
- The plot is light and moves from one date or near-miss to the next. Few threads compete for attention, much like Beach Read.
- Narrative indirection: 22 out of 100
- Two first-person voices state their feelings openly, and the reader sees where they misunderstand each other. Little needs decoding, as in Beach Read.
- Symbolic density: 25 out of 100
- The post office meeting and the fate motif are the main symbols, and both are plainly signposted. The layer is thin.
- Ironic distance: 25 out of 100
- Humor comes from the boys' self-deprecating banter, and the book stays sincere about first love. It is close to It Ends with Us in its earnest tone.
- Resolution withholding: 28 out of 100
- The romance reaches a clear emotional answer in line with genre expectations. Some questions about the future stay open, but this is much like Beach Read's closure.
- Structural complexity: 30 out of 100
- Alternating chapters between Arthur and Ben give light structure, and the timeline is linear through one summer. It is a little more varied than Beach Read.
How What If It's Us is regarded
What If It's Us holds a literary regard score of 29 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.