Stargirl for adults

I almost didn’t do any reading outside of class required reading this past week, until yesterday I got Normal People by Sally Rooney on my Kindle. I’m already halfway through it and very pleased that I’ve finally read something not for class. On one hand, I was feeling really disappointed and upset that I haven’t been reading but on the other, it just feels very hard to make space in my brain right now for new things, which is probably why the only thing I managed to read was a reread of a children’s book. 

Speaking of Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli, I kind of accidentally compared the beginning of Normal People to Stargirl in my head. I feel like the people in this class who really enjoy Sally Rooney might not be so pleased about that but hear me out. Stargirl is all about this girl in high school who is considered weird and different by her peers and the main character falls for her but is embarrassed about it. The results of that embarrassment then differ between the books and there’s obviously a lot less (and by that I mean none at all) drinking and sex in Stargirl, but the starting premises seem pretty similar. Maybe it’s just because Stargirl is the last book I read, but I could not help thinking that they both had these themes of conformity and embarrassment. 

Though interestingly, in my reading of Normal People thus far, Marianne, the supposedly abnormal and strange character, seems pretty normal to me. Maybe that’s the point? I suppose because Stargirl is a children’s book, the nonconformist character of it is much more outwardly wacky, but even then I felt that Stargirl was also not that weird. The main thing with both of them is that they don’t seem to care much how they’re perceived and how socially accepted they are, at least in the beginning of the book for Marianne. 

Anyway, I’m enjoying reading Normal People so far. I like how much conversation there is throughout the book, which is probably intentional. I am relatively apathetic about the dialogue not being in quotations. It is not always clear what’s being said, but for the most part it works fine for me.

Here are some moments I have enjoyed in particular: 

There’s a point near the beginning when Marianne feels like she’s a different person with Connell, but it’s not like she’s actually a different person. Rather, the difference exists somewhere between them, in the connection that they have. This is interesting because people often say that they are different around certain people, but the explanation is never quite like this, and this feels more honest and reflective of the truth to me. It’s not Marianne that is different really, it’s both of them together that feels different. 

Another point I liked was when Connell (I think) is describing the sky in Dublin, and he says that when it’s a clear day, it feels like the sky is very distant, but when it’s cloudy and overcast, everything feels smaller and more closed off. This actually seems really obvious because the sky is technically just space that’s basically infinitely far away while clouds are relatively much closer, but it was written really wonderfully. 

One last thing I liked was when Marianne and Connell are at a pool party with their college friends and Marianne is thinking about how it makes her happy that if she spoke they would all turn around and listen, genuinely interested in what she had to say, but she didn’t have anything to say.

I think I like it so far, though I maintain my Hot Take that it’s Stargirl for adults.