4 Reasons You Should Read Girl Against the Universe by Paula Stokes

Girl Against the Universe by Paula Stokes
Genres: Contemporary (YA), Romance (YA), Coming of Age (YA), Mental Health
Pages: 382
Goodreads

Maguire is bad luck.
No matter how many charms she buys off the internet or good luck rituals she performs each morning, horrible things happen when Maguire is around. Like that time the rollercoaster jumped off its tracks. Or the time the house next door caught on fire. Or that time her brother, father, and uncle were all killed in a car crash—and Maguire walked away with barely a scratch.
It’s safest for Maguire to hide out in her room, where she can cause less damage and avoid meeting new people who she could hurt. But then she meets Jordy, an aspiring tennis star. Jordy is confident, talented, and lucky, and he’s convinced he can help Maguire break her unlucky streak. Maguire knows that the best thing she can do for Jordy is to stay away. But it turns out staying away is harder than she thought.
From author Paula Stokes comes a funny and poignant novel about accepting the past, embracing the future, and learning to make your own luck.

Maguire is the perfect ‘strong female character’

Maguire is a wonderful character. She cares so much about the people around her that she’s sacrificing her entire childhood (this isn’t healthy, I’m just saying that she’s a genuinely kind person).

But mainly, and this is the reason I say she is the perfect strong female character, she lets people in. She doesn’t try to solve everything on her own. Sure, she did this for a long time, but the growth of her character throughout the novel is admirable. She’s not afraid to let someone help her, even if it is a new friend or a boy she kind of likes. I think that makes her stronger than fighting everything on her own. 

Also, she’s Irish and Greek and has big hair just like me so I was super ecstatic about that 😀

Dealing with mental health

Mental health plays a huge (more than huge) role in this story. What is even better is the way it is handled. I’ll probably explain this horribly, but I’m going to give it a shot. I think there is this stigma with mental health, or mental ‘disorders’. There’s the image most people get in their heads of what a person with mental health issues looks like or that certain issues just don’t warrant help (i.e. young people feeling lost, not knowing what they want to do with their life), but this book breaks down that image. It shows two average teenagers, one popular and has so much going for them and one a homebody with no friends, but they both struggle with their own form of problems. And they both are brave enough to ask for help. I like that the story tells the readers that it’s okay to talk to someone, no matter how trivial you think your problems are, or what other people say, it’s okay to talk to someone about it.

That got deep, but really, I think this book does a fantastic job with that and it could help so many people out there that struggle with something.

The perfect romance

This kind of plays into my first two points but the romance is perfection. First off, it’s not insta-love (although, it does accelerate quickly, but that’s not unrealistic). At first, it’s just a crush and you get to read how their relationship grows throughout the novel — as opposed to one random outing and instantly falling in love with each other.

The best part of it is that they are both willing to lean on each other and it isn’t shown as a weakness, it’s shown as a strength. There is nothing wrong with leaning on a boy (or girl) to help you through a tough time.

The Writing & The Feels

I absolutely love Stokes’ writing. It somehow manages to be light and fun but serious at the same time. There were times I laughed (literally, out loud) and times I almost cried (because I can’t let people see me cry 😉 ) and it was just such a wonderful rollercoaster of emotions.

I also didn’t find anything to be predictable (there was one thing I saw coming, but it isn’t a huge revelation). Stokes kept surprising me right when I thought I had it figured out. There isn’t some huge plot twist at the end, what I mean is that there were certain things I thought were going to happen, but Stokes went a different direction. It was fabulous.

Can I really praise this book any further? I think those 4 reasons should be enough to convince you! 😀 This book is a wonderful story of two young teenagers finding themselves by helping each other get there. I loved everything about it.

Rating Report
Plot
Characters
Writing
World Building
Overall:	5 / 5