A captivating novel that explores the complexities of social conventions and the desperate yearning for acceptance "An astonishing first novel...uncannily beautiful." —The New York Times Book Review On the privileged island community where Forgetting Elena takes place, manners are everything. Or so it seems to White's excruciatingly self-conscious young narrator who desperately wants to be accepted in this world where everything from one's bathroom habits to the composition of "spontaneous" poetry is subject to rigid conventions.