During this month I had read a book called Holding Up The Universe by Jennifer Niven. When I read this book it made me wonder why are people the way they are ? That sentence kept going on my mind the entire time I read that book.
This book is about two young teens. A teen boy named jack and a teen girl named Libby who both struggle with their self confidence. Libby who struggles with body shaming and is overweight by 500 pounds when she was only 10 years old and jack who struggles to identify certain peoples faces even the people that he is supposed to call his “family”, that’s called Prosopagnosia (When everyone is a stranger). During the beginning of the story it gives Libby’s life story and about how people would treat her because she was to overweight. Libby during 5th grade had gone overweight because her mother had died and had no other way to express her feelings other than binge eating. At the end of 5th grade she had gotten into homeschooling and went thru homeschooling all the way up into high school until she became a junior in high school. Her dad had decided that it was time for Libby to go into school, to interact with kids. Libbys mom’s death had badly affected Libby and changed her whole life upside down. When Libby got ‘overweight’ the story had mentioned that Libby never looked at herself the same. For two whole years she couldn’t even look at herself in the mirror. She had to special order her clothes because she couldn’t bear the fact that people were going to say mean and cruel stuff about her. There was a rescue team for Libby because at some point she couldn’t even get out of her own bed.
It was the first day of junior high for Libby since her moms death. Everyone had been looking at her as soon as she walked into the school. Dirty looks from everyone. Jack’s friends had eyed Libby. There was this challenge that had been going around the school. Jack’s friend Kam brought it up to jack, that whoever could hug the “fattest” girl the longest would win the challenge. Jack had decided to do it to Libby and embarrassed both Libby and himself. She punched him in the mouth for hugging her so tight. It was barely the second day of school and they both got suspended. Jack had felt bad but didn’t have to guts tell Libby that he was sorry for doing that dumb challenge. Jack had trouble remembering faces but he had remembered Libby’s face. Later in the story jack lets Libby in and lets Libby meet the real jack and not just someone who is stood up like the rest of the school. She sees the real jack. “Libby is the girl whose name everyone knows. But no really sees her except jack.” “Jack is the guy who’s friends with everyone. But he doesn’t let anyone in, except Libby.”
I really enjoyed reading this book, it taught me that everyone really is different. The different points of views in the story had kept me interested. My favorite character is Libby, she is a literal baddie. She stands up for herself and her friends, she won’t let anyone take her down. Not like how people use to. My two favorite quotes from this specific book “‘You never stop missing the people who go away. – For something that isn’t there anymore, it weighs a ton.” and
‘“It’s about the important things, like the way their face lights up when they laugh, or the way they move as they’re walking towards you, or the way their freckles create a map of the stars.” I could relate to this a ton. That’s why I love this book so much, I would 100% recommend this book to someone who loves to read.