In every sprawling epic, there are the innocent bystanders. Kids like the countless unnamed Slytherins from Harry Potter and Mike and Angela from Twilight. They didn't ask for any trouble. They might not even have a lot (or anything) to do in the finale battle. But there they are, having to live their lives among the chaos all the same. Nobody tells their story. Why would it get told? 
 The Rest of Us Just Live Here is audacious. I was under the misguided impression that it would be a lighthearted twist on life when you go to the same high school as the Chosen One. TROUJLH (okay, we'll go with that) doesn't shirk details. It's about dealing with real life--hard, soul-sucking life--in spite of the weird nonsense that takes place in your hometown. Hilariously, this specific hometown is never named, but Twilight and The 100 and Zom-B and The Fault in Our Stars and many more all seem to have taken place there. At one point, Henna remarks on the time when "all those kids were dying beautifully of cancer." From the constant skewering of YA series and the totally insane plot that's happening inside of the book, I couldn't help but shake the sense that TROUJLH was biting the hand that fed it. It goes too far beyond a loving parody and maybe I'm just sensitive because I'm constantly defending YA lit. (But then, so is Patrick Ness, probably. Maybe this book is born out of that defense?) Each chapter is introduced with a blurb of what would be happening in the epic version of this tale. Half of the kids are named Finn and the rest have weird names like Satchel and Wisconsin. The rest of the normals refer to them as the "indie kids" and there's some indication that every generation past has had its own group of indie kids, although all of the adults in the story are mostly useless and have tried to forgot their own tempestuous pasts. The indie kids die all of the time. Seriously. There's some business with the Immortals and lost relics and you're not really meant to keep up with it. 
 Mikey and his crew know that strange stuff goes down all the time. They just want to make it to college alive, but they aren't worried about dying like the indie kids. They deal with OCD and anorexia and depression and car accidents. You know, normal teenager stuff. Mikey and his sisters have a mostly absent politician mother and an alcoholic father. I think I felt uncomfortable with the harshness of their world (which is never unrealistic, mind you) because I like my magic separate from my realism. I enjoy knowing that magic spells can change everything. TROUJLH forces the reader to confront everything that they know about the real world and how problems are solved. The end result is very, very effective. Not everyone gets to be the hero/heroine, you know? Mental illness is figured out one day at a time. Relationships don't get fixed because the world is just about to end. They get fixed because people work on stuff together. These things take time. 
 Older teens will appreciate the raw, tense feelings that are utilized. Younger readers might be a tad overwhelmed. I'm glad TROUJLH exists, but I don't think I can revisit it in the near future. 
 Initial review: Oof. That was...bleak. More soon.