Me Thinks #8: Girl Against The Universe

Title: Girl Against The Universe
Author: Paula Stokes
Pages / Year: 400 / 2016
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4/5

The title of this post was, up until a few hours ago, "First Thoughts" but then I lost myself in the book and I finished it so fast that suddenly my thoughts weren't the first aymore, they were the last. Final opinion, here we go.

This book is so delicious, so good, so beautiful, so...so...so.... (I know perfection does not exist but I honestly can't find anything bad in this book!)

I got this book solemnly for the cover (yes!! I am one of those people, oops) and because I completly adore tennis (as in, obsessed!) so obviously I didn't even think twice about starting this book when I had to travel into the city and I was automatically hooked! I honestly couldn't put it down while I didn't finish it and then I felt kinda glum because aww...  wanted more from Jordy and Maguire.

The book tells the story of Maguire, the unluckiest luckiest person that I have ever met (?? read about, more like it) who is always getting herself into accidents but always manages to get away without a scratch even if people around her, end up suffering in double. Maguire is in therapy so she can overcome a lot of the bad things that happened in her life. She is a 16 year old who has PTSD and who meets a young tennis player who feels lost about who he really is and they will develop a friendship (and obvi, something more) while helping each other with their therapy homework.

This story is mostly about Maguire's menthal health problems, always written with a loveable humour but also in such a profound way that we can't help but feel for the characters. This book is so easy and light to read but has such an important and subtle message and...okay, I confess, I kind of cried at the end????!

I adored Maguire and Jordy soooo much. I thought Maguire's rituals were so fun and how she always connected everything with luck and badluck to feel better! And what I loved the most was that Maguire's personality and rituals were never put aside and forgotten so the romance could shine, no! Maguire's problems were always front and centre and it was so refreshing.

I confess that when it was written how Jordy was feeling so tired all the time me, an hypocondriac, started to go into alert mode and being like "PLEASE DON'T YOU DIE!". Man, this book!! But I'll talk more about this down below in the spoilers!

And now off you go, to get this book and binge read it like I did! You'll love it so much and you'll really laugh out loud at some parts, promise!


As one of my favourite quotes, I choose:
"Sometimes terrible things happen and it's no one's fault. Sometimes we do the best we can but still have bad outcomes."

***************SPOILERS BELLOW***************

During the majority of this book, I was wondering when the big castastrophy was going to happen. Maybe I'm just a little traumatized by "The Fault in Our Stars" but when it was mentioned that Jordy was always tired, I thought "there it goes, tragedy. He's going to die and there goes my emotions with him!"

Then, the accident happened. Another "oh crap" moment.

And PHEW! I survived these pages with my heart intact! THANK YOU, PAULA STOKES!!!!

One of the things that I loved the most in this book was that it wasn't the usual cliché with a really huge drama or a side romance (yes, I thought Jordy was going to be caught with his tongue in Kimber's mouth) or even that the Queen B would be a bitch (let's be honest, Kimber was cool!). Nope. This book wasn't one of those romances about highschool adventures. This was about Maguire, her fears, traumas and expectations.

I loved it so much.

I'm still waiting for the short story where we will see that Kimber was always in love with Penn, though, because... I mean... why not? I know there weren't any clues or hints about it but I can see it, I think they'd be lovely together.