There is a truly heartbreaking moment when Jack has to pick up his little brother from a party, and, oh my god, it is one of the most upsetting things I've ever read. It was compelling and didn't seem as offensive as the blurb had been, but the more I think about it, the more that doesn't seem to be enough of an excuse for the book as a whole. Since her mum's death, she's been picking up the pieces in the privacy of her home, dealing with her heartbroken father and her own grief.

I’m talking about no structure, nonexistent plot, plain characters, messy storylines, those commonly known as guilty pleasure reads. Jack has always seemed like someone who has it all, and knows it—he's good-looking, a bit cocky, and tends to swagger through school. After lossing hundreds of pound weight when Libby joins school, she face many problems like bulling, getting insult from everyone, pranks and that's how she met Jack. I've experienced bullying over my weight when I was a kid and I've also heard/read stories from kids/teens/adults who've experienced the same in my field of expertise. It's not a major element of the book, but it's present and something Libby struggles with occassionally.

I thought this would make for an interesting plot, especially if he can’t recognise his girlfriend – but I sort of forgot that he had the condition near the end of the book and I think the author did too. He didn’t humiliate her as others did and he truly saw her as a person, a nice and funny and trust-worthy person. My main problem with her is that she really does not want to be known as the fat girl anymore but she’s CONSTANTLY talking about it.

I know what you’re thinking- if you hate it so much and it’s such a burden, just lose the weight, and then that job will go away.

My new title will be high school junior, which, let's face it, sounds a lot better than America's Fattest Teen. At once hilarious and achingly poignant, Jennifer Niven's Holding up the Universe brims with love and heart and hope. It feels like the characters are a means to an end for the purposes of creating a relationship and isolating their differences so that they are SOLELY DEFINED by those differences (despite claims to the otherwise). Even with the problematic writing at some places and the unromantic romance, I’d say this book is still a must read. It would be like someone telling me "Oh, you suffered from epilepsy/seizures for the first eight years of your life, that makes you a freak, so the only person who could ever love or understand you is someone who is just as socially ostracized as you are, and there's no one you can talk about it to, and it's going to keep you messing up in life and you're just going to be miserable until you find love in someone else, because apparently your self-love doesn't exist unless you're with that person .

But more than that, this is a book about letting people see who you really are, and admitting when you need help. We don’t share your credit card details with third-party sellers, and we don’t sell your information to others.I was willing to pick this book up despite my experiences with "All The Bright Places" (which I didn't care for either, but I did applaud some aspects of the novel in the aftermath of the overarching read). The plot is a bit of a stretch but an unusual and heart-warming protagonist in Libby Strout really transforms this from a typical boy-meets-girl coming of age story into a really enjoyable read.