As charming and unique as its sensitive, nonconformist heroine.' - School Library Journal 'Anyone who loved Jerry Spinelli's beautiful, poignant young adult novel Stargirl is in for a treat with his latest novel. Louis Post-Dispatch 'Touching and inspiring.' - VOYA 'The many readers who loved the first book will embrace this sequel.' - Booklist, 'Humor, graceful writing, lively characters, and important lessons about life will make this a hit with fans of Stargirl. Anyone who survived or is enduring the teenage years will repeatedly recognize him or herself in these pages-and find the book hard to put down.' - St. (Aug.'Humor, graceful writing, lively characters, and important lessons about life will make this a hit with fans of Stargirl. For Leo, caught between his peers and his connection to Stargirl, the essential question boils down to one offered to him by a sage adult friend: ''Whose affection do you value more, hers or the others'?'' As always respectful of his audience, Spinelli poses searching questions about loyalty to one's friends and oneself and leaves readers to form their own answers. As her cheerleading antics draw record crowds to the school's losing football team's games, her popularity skyrockets, yet a subtle foreboding infuses the narrative and readers know it's only a matter of time until she falls from grace. Having been homeschooled, Stargirl appears at Mica High dressed as a hippie holdover and toting a ukulele, which she uses to serenade students on their birthdays she marks holidays with Halloween candy and Valentine cards for all. By describing the girl through the eyes of a teen intermittently repulsed by and in love with her, Spinelli cunningly exposes her elusive qualities. Even before she appears at Mica High, Spinelli hints at her invisible presence readers, like Leo, will wonder if Stargirl is real or some kind of mirage in the Sonoran Desert. As narrator Leo Borlock reflects on his junior year in a New Mexico high school, Stargirl takes center stage.

Part fairy godmother, part outcast, part dream-come-true, the star of Spinelli's latest novel possesses many of the mythical qualities as the protagonist of his Maniac Magee.

Star Girl by jerry-spinelli