I received this in return for an honest review.

I really didn’t enjoy it. Nothing much happened and the copy seemed to have the letter f missing. Very odd.

Unfortunately, I have not been able to read and review this book.

After losing and replacing my broken Kindle and getting a new phone I was unable to download the title again for review as it was no longer available on Netgalley.

I’m really sorry about this and hope that it won’t affect you allowing me to read and review your titles in the future.

Thank you so much for giving me this opportunity.
Natalie.

I read this book as a child and absolutely adored it, so having the opportunity to revisit this was great. I adore the way Spinelli creates his characters. Stargirl and Mica are fantastic and wat hing Mica fall in love with Stargirl is lovely.

I honestly believe this is a children's classic and deserves all the praise. It is timeless.

This book really piqued my interest when it appeared on Netgalley for a variety of reasons: the fact that it is defined as a classic of sorts, the fact that schools have banned this book in the past, and the huge amount of mixed reviews it has received. 'Wow' I thought. 'This is going to be a marmite book, I'll either love it or hate it'. Sadly I was wrong, because I only found it...okay. I was hoping to be blown away by the controversy this book has caused so you can imagine that in a way, this was a bit disappointing for me.

As I read my first impression was that it's easy to see why this book has reached so many people. It's short length and relevant subject matter for teens make it one for the school lists. And I liked the message it was trying to promote: that people should spend less time trying to fit in and please others, and more time being kind and happy. Things I liked about this book other than it's message? Well the writing was pretty good, there was a very interesting study on a lot of character archetypes and why people (especially teens) fall so easily into them. I also thought that Stargirl herself was a cool depiction of what outside the norm could look like.

But while thinking all this, I couldn't help but notice that in some ways I agreed with the majority. I don't mind cheering for the other team, and I thought it was cool not wrong that Stargirl helped the injured player, but showing up at a stranger's funeral? Or buying another stranger a welcome home gift? The constant stalking? That IS creepy. Thoughtful, but creepy. Leo was not a likeable character either, and he had NO depth. At all. He literally was an observant and hypocritical narrator, and that's IT. A real shame that the book spent so much time being 'out there' and not enough developing a decent plot or character profiles.