Stargirl (2000) (edit title/settings)

Ridiculously Simplified Synopsis edit see section history

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Summary edit see section history

Characters/People edit see section history

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• Susan Julia "Stargirl" Caraway: The protagonist of the story. She is unique and different. She is a non-conformist and has an impeccable school spirit which makes her the buzz about in Mica Area High School. Stargirl is like an ambassador for individuality. Even after she leaves Mica, she leaves a tidal wave in her wake. She loves to be herself, no matter what people think. One of her favorite things to do is make other people happy, no matter how the cost affects her. She also has lots of quirky habits, like dropping change, making up stories for people in public, keeping a happy wagon, erasing herself, going to funerals for people she doesn't know, sending presents to people she doesn't know, and keeping a scrapbook for a young boy in her neighborhood. She has a rat, Cinnamon, that she brings to school and everywhere. She is extremely kind and loves to help people. She is called Stargirl, but she always changes he name.
• Leo Borlock: The narrator of the story. Leo is a teenager who falls in love with the main character Stargirl and desperately wants her to change everything about herself so she can be the perfect girlfriend and he can keep his popularity level to high.
• Kevin Quinlan: Leo's best friend. He is the on camera host of their in-school TV show, Hot Seat. He, unlike Leo, he is like the rest of the school and wants only to break Stargirl down and expose her. Like the rest of the school, he is concerned about his social status, and can't understand Leo's actions as he begins to fall for Stargirl.
• Archie Hapwood Brubaker: He was a paleontologist. He was also teaching at universities in the East. Today, he teaches kids of all ages about nature and fossils. The kids are members of his Loyal Order of The Stone Bone. He loves sharing his wisdom with kids and even though it doesn't always make sense to them, they always come back, for he has a great understanding of what life really is. He has a Giant Cactua name Senior Saguaro who is his best friend.
• Mr. McShane: The Mica High's faculty representative to the state oratorical contest.
• Wayne Parr: Hillari Kimble's boyfriend. He is gorgeous but doesn't have any achievements. He is the total opposite of Hillari. He is basically the reflection of the students at Mica High. His ultimate goal in life is to be a guy model. At the end of the book, he breaks up with Hillari and mentions joining the marine corps.
• Hillari Kimble: A selfish popular girl who hates Stargirl, smashed her happy face cookie with her shoe, rules the school, and is dating stupid, ordinary Wayne Parr. She can't believe how a girl cannot conform or act "normal." She creates theories about Stargirl's behavior! One of the most popular girls in school, but more like the dictator. She is very mean to a lot of people; especially Stargirl because Stargirl is so different.
• Dori Dilson: One and only friend of Stargirl that loves her for who she is. She is a brown-haired ninth-grader who wrote poems in a looseleaf note book half as big as herself. One of the few people who actually looks up to Stargirl and is there forever and always to support her in almost anything she does -unless that something is changing herself to fit the mold that the rest of Mica High has formed.
• Ron Kovac: The six-foot-eight basketball superstar of Sun Valley. He breaks his ankle during a competition game with Mica High School, and Stargirl is the only person besides the coach to offer consolation. Stargirl's shunning really picks up at this point.
• Stargirl: The mysterious star of the show whom everyone envies and resents. Very courageous, and dates with Leo Borlock. First everyone is shunned by her, then she becomes popular. However, the miracle doesn't last forever. Everyone turns their back to Stargirl... which puts Leo into confusion. She is also very different and kind. She hardly does anything for herself and loves to help others and never herself.
• Mallory Stillwell: The captain of the cheerleaders in Mica Area High School. She is the first popular girl to befriend Stargirl and eventually put her on the cheer-leading squad, which gets her a lot of infamy.
• Mrs. Caraway: The mother of Stargirl. She was once Stargirl's teacher and she also makes costumes for movies. When Leo meets her, she's fashioning a costume for a production to appear in Denver, CO.
• Charles Caraway: He is the father of Stargirl and he works in MicaTronics. Cares very much for Stargirl. Notices things you wouldn't expect.
• Anna Grisdale: A senior girl who lost her grandfather after a long illness. Stargirl came to her funeral,but Anna's mother got seriously mad and kicked her out.
• Mr. Robineau: The faculty advisor. Drives Stargirl to her oratorical competition in Phoenix so that she can give a speech.
• Jennifer St. John: One of the Hot Seat jury members.
• Damon Ricci: One of the Hot Seat jury members.
• Mike Ebersole: One of the Hot Seat jury members.
• Becca Rinaldi: One of the Hot Seat jury members.
• Renee Bozeman: One of the Mica High shows; Hot Seat jury members run by Leo and Kevin.
• Raymond Studemacher: The guy who danced with Stargirl at the Ocotillo ball. Also referred to as Raymond Something, because people can never remember his last name.
• Cinnamon: Stargirl's rat that she absolutely adores. He is like her little baby and she never leaves him behind wherever she goes.
• Peter Sinkowitz: A young boy who lives across the street who Stargirl watches and makes a scrapbook of to give to him when he is older.
• Stargirl: Weird.
• Danny Pike: Add a description of this character.
• Señor Saguaro: A cactus who is Archie's friend and "brother".
• Adam
• Clarissa
• Guy Greco
• Alan Ferko: The firat person that Stargirl sings happy birthday too.
• Jennifer
• Chico

Quotes edit see section history

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• “She was elusive. She was today. She was tomorrow. She was the faintest scent of a cactus flower, the flitting shadow of an elf owl. We did not know what to make of her. In our minds we tried to pin her to a corkboard like a butterfly, but the pin merely went through and away she flew.”

  Leo

• “It was a rebellion she led, a rebellion for rather then against. For ourselves.”

  Leo

• “"I wanted to feel myself getting closer step by step, feel the tension rising like fizz in a soda bottle."”

  Leo

• “The echo of her laughter is the second sunrise I awaken to each day, and at night I feel it is more than stars looking down on me.”

  Leo

• “There was no direction to my liberation. I had no urge to color my hair or trash my sneakers. So I just enjoyed the feeling and watched the once amorphous student body separate itself into hundreds of individuals. The pronoun "we" itself seemed to rack and drift apart in pieces.”

  Leo

• “Like so many of Archie's words, they seemed not to enter through my ears but to settle on my skin, there to burrow like tiny eggs awaiting the rain of my maturity, when they would hatch and I at last would understand.”

  Leo

• “Why wait to feel great? Celebrate now.”

  Stargirl

• “When a Stargirl cries, she does not shed tears but light.”

  Archie Brubaker

• “The trouble with miracles is, they don't last long.”

  Archie Brubaker

• “The earth is speaking to us, but we can't hear because of all the racket our senses are making. Sometimes we need to erase them, erase our senses. Then--maybe--the earth will touch us. The universe will speak. The stars will whisper.”

  Stargirl

• “Stargirl. Though I think she had simpler things in mind. Star people are rare. You'll be lucky to meet another.”

  Archie Brubaker

• “Stargirl: Do you believe in enchanted places? | Leo: You talking to me or the rat? | Stargirl: You. | Leo: I don't know. I never thought about it. | Stargirl: I'm going to show you one. | Leo: What if I don't want to see it? | Stargirl: You think you have a choice? ............ Stargirl: Look familiar? | Leo: It's where we came that day. | Stargirl: We? I was coming out here, you were half a mile behind. Sneaking after me. Stalking me. | Leo: Stalking? I was not stalking. I was just lagging behind a little, that's all. | Stargirl: Following me. | Leo: So? | Stargirl: Why? | Leo: I don't know. | Stargirl: You liked me. | Leo: ... <Smiled> | Stargirl: You were smitten with me. You were speechless to behold my beauty. You had never met anyone so fascinating. You thought of me every waking minute. You dreamed about me. You couldn't stand it. You couldn't let such wonderfulness out of your sight. You had to follow me. | Leo: Don't give yourself so much credit. It was your rat I was after.”

• “Stargirl: Don't get a big head, mister. I was allowed to invite two friends along. You weren't the only one I asked. | Leo: So who was the other? | Stargirl: Dori. | Leo: Well, then. I think I'll go for the big head. Dori isn't another guy.”

• “Stargirl: Are you getting acquainted with Cinnamon? | Leo: Sort of? | Stargirl: Are you lying? | Leo: Sort of. | Stargirl: Are you afraid of rats? | Leo: Sort of. | Stargirl: Do you think I'm cute? If you say sort of, I'll tell Cinnamon to bite you. | Leo: Yes. | Stargirl: Yes, what? | Leo: I think you're cute.”

• “Nobody has the time. The time cannot be owned. The time is free to everyone.”

  Stargirl

• “Just two weeks before, I had found out she knew my name, and now I was loopy with love. I was floating. I floated up the white light that washed my sheets and slept on the moon.”

  Leo Borlock

• “I was Susan Caraway's boyfriend. I. Me. Really? That Susan Caraway? The one with the tiny barrettes and toe rings? Yep, that's the one, my girlfriend. Call me Mr. Susan.”

  Leo Borlock

• “It's really hard to do nothing totally. Even just sitting here, like this, our bodies are churning, our minds are chattering. There's a whole commotion going on inside us.”

  Stargirl

• “It's my happy wagon. Actually, it could just as well be called an unhappy wagon, but I prefer happy. It's about how I feel. When something makes me happy, I put a pebble in the wagon. If I'm unhappy, I take a pebble out. There are twenty pebbles in all.”

  Stargirl

• “I pledge allegiance to United Turtles of America and to the fruit bats of Borneo, one planet in the Milky Way, incredible, with justice and black bean burritos for all.”

  Stargirl

• “In the eyes of the student body, she was part of my identity. I was "her boyfriend." I was Mr. Stargirl.”

  Leo Borlock

• “I'm not my name. My name is something I wear, like a shirt. It gets worn, I outgrow it, I change it.”

  Stargirl

• “Events become feelings, feelings become events. Head and heart are contrary historians.”

  Leo Borlock

• “Leo thought a lot about Stargirl, especially at night in the moonlight. It was during such a time that Leo decided that Stargirl was indeed real.”

• Popular Highlights from Kindle Customers

• She laughed when there was no joke. She danced when there was no music. She had no friends, yet she was the friendliest person in school.

  Highlighted by 167 Kindle customers

• She was elusive. She was today. She was tomorrow. She was the faintest scent of a cactus flower, the flitting shadow of an elf owl. We did not know what to make of her. In our minds we tried to pin her to a corkboard like a butterfly, but the pin merely went through and away she flew.

  Highlighted by 130 Kindle customers

• “On the contrary, she is one of us. Most decidedly. She is us more than we are us. She is, I think, who we really are. Or were.”

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• It was a rebellion she led, a rebellion for rather than against. For ourselves. For the dormant mud frogs we had been for so long.

  Highlighted by 116 Kindle customers

• All of her feelings, all of her attentions flowed outward. She had no ego.

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• “You’ll know her more by your questions than by her answers. Keep looking at her long enough. One day you might see someone you know.”

  Highlighted by 107 Kindle customers

• Whose affection do you value more, hers or the others’? The Señor says everything will follow from that.”

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• “Best hope it’s not,” he said. “The trouble with miracles is, they don’t last long.”

  Highlighted by 87 Kindle customers

• “…and then—ah—we open our eyes and the day is before us, and”—he snapped his fingers—“we become ourselves.”

  Highlighted by 86 Kindle customers

• She cheered when we scored. When Sun Valley scored, she did not. Something inside me felt better.

  Highlighted by 70 Kindle customers

Setting & Locations edit see section history

• Mica Area High School: A school in Arizona where Leo and Stargirl attended.
• Archie Brubaker's House: It is a house of bones. There were bones in every room, every closet and on the back porch.
• The Caraways' House: It was a single story and an ordinary home with pale adobe and clay-red pipetile roof. It is located in Palo Verde.
• Roma Delite: A pizza place.

Organizations edit see section history

• Hot Seat: A show that Leo Borlock directs, and Kevin, his best friend,is the host of it. Kevin tries to talk Leo into signing Stargirl up for it. When the show comes up, Stargirl is in it, and everything goes wrong with the jury hating her.

First Sentence edit see section history

Table of Contents edit see section history

Glossary edit see section history

• Acclamation: general demonstration of approval

Themes & Symbolism edit see section history

• Individuality: Describe this theme.
• Group Shunning

Series & Lists edit see section history

Followed by Love, Stargirl.

Authors & Contributors edit see section history

1. Jerry Spinelli (Author)

Other Contributors:

1. Joan Slattery (Editor)
2. Alfred A. Knopf (Illustrator)
3. Randomhouse Inc.

First Edition edit see section history

Awards edit see section history

• Iowa Teen Award (2003, #1)
• Young Hoosier Book Award (Indiana) (2003)
• Texas Lone Star Reading List (2001)

Classification edit see section history

• Library of Congress: PZ7.S75663 2000
• Dewey: Add the Dewey Classification.

Notes for Parents edit see section history

This book is really cute and good for ages 9 -12. I have read it twice, even being above those levels.

Subjects edit see section history

• Books › Teens › School & Sports › Fiction
• Books › Teens › Literature & Fiction › Love & Romance

More Books Like This edit see section history