Love, Stargirl | Jerry Spinelli | KCS Love, Stargirl review

Love, Stargirl | Jerry Spinelli | Story speaks to me and has a different lens that first book

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Love, Stargirl

	Love, Stargirl Jerry Spinelli Knopf Books for Young Readers, 2007 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 40 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

KCS Love, Stargirl review

Have you ever experienced a broken heart?
In this sequel to Stargirl, Stargirl is beginning to heal after an ugly break up with her old boyfriend Leo. Now, she is back to being home schooled by her family. In her new home, Stargirl doesn't cease to be the one who stands out. Yet she still meets some equally strange and outgoing people like Betty Lou the agoraphobic, Charlie who is constantly camping out by his deceased wife's grave, and Dootsie her new best friend who happens to be five years old.
This year Stargirl is still heartbroken, and she begins to notice a change in herself. She doesn't feel like Stargirl anymore. Somehow along the way of being sad, she forgot the meaning of her name which is to spread light. While trying to find herself and calm her broken heart, things get more complicated when she notices a rather strange boy wandering around. He steals, was sent to boot camp and already has an official club of girls who adore him. Stargirl finds herself developing feelings for him anyway. New questions she dreads to answer come across like; has she finally stopped loving Leo? Does she have true feelings for this mysterious boy?
The book is told from Stargirl's point of view written in letters addressing Leo. Throughout the story she debates whether or not to send him the letters because they express her true feelings. The pacing was a little slow. I felt the author's craft was rather mysterious in the way that Stargirl always seems to see something deeper than what is on the outside and has a strong spiritual connection with nature. I don't think this book was written in a Christian perspective because it never mentions God although Stargirl considers many spiritual thoughts. This is one of those books that it isn't absolutely necessary to read the prequel. In the first book, Stargirl appears almost alien. But now that the story is told from her point of view, she definitely seems more human. I recommend this book to pretty much anybody, but especially girls twelve years old and up because they could better understand the unique feelings of Stargirl.

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Story speaks to me and has a different lens that first book

I found Stargirl and Love, Stargirl as part of my middle shool daughter's book report. I absolutely love them both. Of course, a good part is due to I related to the characters in age (born approx same years) and experiences. And I'm not even a girl. :) I am looking at people differently now.

The lens of the narrator is very very different between the two books, which may explain some of the reactions of the other reviewers. The very stylized and longing reflection of Leo shows the magical side of Stargirl. The second book shows how normal Stargirl really is but you can still see her through an the external lens if you want to.

I can only add to the other reviews that what I enjoy most of the books is the open ended conclusion that allows you to write your own ending.

With movie version of Stargirl in the works, I'm very glad Jerry revisited Stargirl and developed her some more. Maybe they'll adjust it for the second book a little. I really hope that this goes better than the Nickelodeon version of Maniac Magee.

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The Star Has Dimmed a Bit

I have to admit I couldn't wait to read this as 'Stargirl' was such a wonderful, moving affirmation of individuality and being true to yourself. Unfortunately for me, alot of the magic that was this girl has been replaced by a more generic and routine romanticism of a teenage girl pining for the boy she loves. The book which reads as a letter to her dear Leo, follows a year in Stargirl's life, now living in a small Pennsylvania town. She befriends some of the eccentric Star Hollows type locals, acts as a 'big sister' to one of the younger girls in town, and finds her interest piqued by a cute mysterious bad boy many of the girls in town seem smitten with. There are definite moments that seem like the Stargirl from the first book, but too many are superceded by her unbearable ache for Leo which frankly reduces her star wattage and made her, well,just like everybody else.

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Falling Stars Can Make You Go Blind.

When I first heard that Jerry Spinelli was writing a sequel to the book STARGIRL, I was extremely excited and completed horrified at the same time. STARGIRL is one of my favorite books of all time. Full of beauty and innocence, it perfectly captures the true love that a boy can have for a girl and how that love is affected by popularity and trying to conform to society's standards. The book is also one of the best books I have ever read about being a nonconformist and staying true to an idealistic life. STARGIRL introduced one of the most interesting and intriguing characters I have met in young adult fiction: Stargirl. She is a girl full of imperfections, yet because of the way she lives her life she IS the perfect girl, especially for Leo Borlock.

The idea of a sequel to STARGIRL excited me very much. After all, when you meet a person you like (in real life, too), you want to continue traveling with them and having adventures with them. You keep rereading their stories again and again. Even though you know the outcome before you begin to re-read, the story is still fresh and invigorating because you're back home with old friends. The idea of reading more of Stargirl's life and adventures was quite exciting.

Yet, the idea also frightened me a great deal. STARGIRL is almost a perfect book. It does have a somewhat open ending, yet not so much to make a person not know what the ultimate outcome will be. Also, STARGIRL is also told from the point of view of Leo Borlock. Part of my fascination with the novel is because I am able to relate so closely to Leo's character. I had learned that LOVE, STARGIRL was supposed to be told from Stargirl's point of view and I feared that a story like that would destroy the affinity I had felt for her in STARGIRL. So, with excited trepidation I began reading LOVE, STARGIRL.

LOVE, STARGIRL begins about six months after the main story in STARGIRL ended and is written in the form of a year-long series of journal entries that Stargirl has written to Leo Burlock. She intends to send him a letter, but being who she is it can't just be a normal letter and ends up being the world's longest letter. As the letters progress through time we learn that Stargirl and her family are now living in Pennsylvania. She has gone back to being home schooled and her father has become a milk man. Stargirl misses Leo very much and their break-up combined with her family's move has almost emptied her happy wagon. In short, Stargirl doesn't seem very much like Stargirl at all. She decides she has been living in too much seclusion and begins meeting and befriending some of the people in her neighborhood. There's the precocious red-haired five-year-old girl named Dootsie; the widower Charlie who spends his days sitting next to his wife's grave; Alvina, a preteen girl who works at a local bakery and seems ready to fight anyone who even gives her a sideway glance; a woman who hasn't been outside of her house for several years named Betty Lou; and Perry Delloplane, a blue-eyed hottie who pilfers whatever he needs, has a harem of girls that adore him, and seems intent on winning Stargirl's heart. Stargirl has a series of adventures, but everything builds until a grand celebration she has planned for Winter Solstice and the decision she must make between Perry and Leo.

Overall, LOVE, STARGIRL isn't a very bad book. Spinelli is a young adult author who writes a notch above the rest. His books tend to be better written than many in the genre and this one is no exception. At the same time, I found LOVE, STARGIRL to be a bit of a letdown. The book took some of the magic away from the character of Stargirl and portrays her as being an average, though highly eccentric, teenage girl. To me, it diminishes the story told in STARGIRL. Also, even though there is the novelty of the story being told through a series of letters, the book just isn't as strongly written as the original. I love STARGIRL, but I only came away liking LOVE, STARGIRL.

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disappointing but with a sweet ending

On January 1, the year after Stargirl moves away from Arizona, she starts a letter to her old boyfriend Leo. The letter becomes her diary of her new life in Pennsylvania, which she keeps over the course of a year. She is back to being home schooled, meditating in deserted places, and reaching out to others with kindness and love.

This is a major step down from its prequel, Stargirl (which enchanted me). One reason is that the book mixes Stargirl's account of her daily life (which is interesting) with extensive, unending pinings for Leo. Epistolary novels can be interesting (Dear Exile is one that I enjoyed), but usually that's because the other person writes back. In this case, Leo is made a significant character because Stargirl constantly talks to him and about him, but he's silent and that slows the book down.

Part of the magic of the first book was that Stargirl herself was magical. She was kinder and more loving and more inclusive than anyone any of us know. As Spinelli said in an interview, she was intended to "raise dust in the corners of credibility" [1]. She is a magical, inspiring person to aspire towards but never to quite understand (kind of like Dumbledore). Spinelli makes her more of a real person now that she is the narrator of this book, and that takes away some of the magic.

In her pining for Leo she also seems to have lost some of her random reaching out to strangers, at least at the beginning of the book. She is still kind to those around her, and she occasionally has those moments with strangers (like leaving donuts for an old man in a cemetery), but her life is less filled with random kindness (like leaving change on the ground to make lucky finders happy).

Finally, Spinelli re-writes history a little bit at the end. (In some books, doing that will lead crazed fans to inflict bodily harm on an author.) He inserts some events that clearly would have been part of Leo's narrative at the end of the first book, had they occurred.

All that said, Stargirl is still a kind, wonderful person, and the book eventually picks up steam. It ends with a climactic, feel-good event (think of the Ocotillo Ball at the end of the last book) and plenty of optimism. The ending bumped my rating up from two to three stars. And Spinelli leaves the door open for a future book to answer our questions about that porcupine tie Leo received at the end of the first book.

(Maybe I was just bitter that this book doesn't have an audiobook narrated by John Ritter. Couldn't they have gotten Chrissy or Janet to narrate this one?)

[1] Jerry Spinelli, in an interview published at the back of the 2000 Knopf paperback edition of Stargirl.

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, page 6, 7, 8

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