Stella (Temperley High, #1)

by Helen Eve

[Leah]

I have to be honest, I’m sitting here having just finished Stella by Helen Eve and I’m just sort of wondering what in the WORLD to say. My mind is literally spinning with the events at the end of the novel. I just WHAT. WHAT THE WHAT JUST HAPPENED? Where is a WTF GIF when you need one, and I am not the type to use GIFs in my reviews, but right now? I could use a few. My head literally feels full to bursting with everything that just happened, and makes me SO bloody glad I requested this book on Netgalley. I hmmmed and harred about it for a while, but eventually clicked ‘Request’ and oh, dear, God, thank God I did! Stella is like Mean Girls on Speed.

Stella is like no other book you will ever read, at least I don’t think so. It opens in the most astounding way, with one of the most self-assured Prologue’s you will ever read – with the protagonist warning you that you will not like them, and you will most certainly not be getting any kind of tale of redemption out of them. The trouble is, I actually have my doubts now about who wrote the Prologue. I suspect Stella, and I think it is, having gone back and re-read it, but it is not attributed to either Stella or Caitlin, and there is reasonable doubt, but I’m fairly certain. From there, you sort of know you’re not getting the kind of story you might usually get when you pick up a book. This isn’t a book about good people, there isn’t going to be a happy ending, and you’re probably not going to like any of the girls you’re about to meet. MY KIND OF NOVEL.

Novels set in schools are my favourite kind. I never got to finish school, my school up until I was there didn’t really have overly popular kids, not kids like Stella or the Stars anyway, so I’m always fascinated by schools that do. I mean, I was hardly popular at school (I SO WASN’T, I was a swot, and happy to be so, I’ll be honest) and I didn’t have many friends so I do like reading about kids who are popular and who do rule the school, because let’s be honest, if we all had that chance to do that, wouldn’t we jump at it? I know I would. Just to experience it. And anyone who answers that question differently is lying. Everyone at school wants to be popular, wants to be Queen Bee and Stella Hamilton runs Temperley High. She’s following in the footsteps of her sister Siena, and she’s going to be Head Girl, no doubt about. Until Caitlin Clark arrives, fresh from America, and perfect to fill the recently vacated spot in the Stars line-up, after the exclusion of Ruby. Stella’s got it all figured out, until it all starts going drastically wrong, and soon the Stars find themselves on opposites sides, and the battle for Head Girl is about to go disastrously wrong.

Stella actually really surprised me. The Prologue had me hooked – I liked the refreshing honesty, and from there I was sucked in. I didn’t expect the two narratives, from Caitlin and Stella, but I found it was quite fresh, because Caitlin and Stella were such polar opposites, until Caitlin started morphing into Stella before my eyes. I have to be honest, I never really hated Stella. Sure, she’s hardly an angel, and sure, she might tell some porky pies, but I never got the feeling that she was bad to the bone, and as the novel wore on, I started feeling sympathy for her and actually came around to liking her. Whereas the exact opposite happened with Caitlin. I loved her initially, until she started treating her first proper friends Lucy and Hannah horribly, and began her transformation into Stella. If I’m being brutally honest, I think Caitlin went way too far, and that’s why I probably ended up actually sympathising with Stella, which was a total turn up for the books as far as I was concerned. I didn’t expect it at all.

The ending of Stella was mind-boggling. If I’m honest, it probably could have been dumbed down a little bit just to make more sense, there’s a chapter that just sounded like gobbledy-gook, but that could be because I was trying desperately to find out just what the hell had happened. It was insane. It was like the book was awesome already, and then it all just EXPLODED into craziness I can’t even explain into words. IT WAS JUST CRAZY. Like, boom! My mind exploded. I really would like to shake Helen Eve’s hand on managing to make me gabble like a loon while I tried to decipher everything. It’s an ending to be proud of. I still can’t get my head around it. Mind = boggled. Helen Eve is a stunning writer, she really is. She’s crafted such an amazing tale, with two fantastic lead characters – I may not have liked them at times, but they were amazing and really held their own against each other. I loved the idea of the Stars, and liked getting to know the other girls. The only thing I perhaps didn’t care for was the romance because it was all a bit love-your-neighbour, with everyone going out with everyone else, although I did personally prefer Luke over Edward. I loved this book a lot. So much. It may even require a paperback copy for my keepers shelf. I can’t wait to see what Helen Eve writes next because she’s a genius.