Sadly, this one didn't work for me. I ended up DNF'ing it at 100 pages. Thank you for the opportunity to read it.

DNF. I own 3 of this others other books and have since tried those and I'm just going to admit that she isn't for me. Her covers are pretty, the books are thick, but the stories just aren't for me.

It's always important to have stories like these that help us understand the struggles and the situations gone thru in other countries. This book was an eye opener, I loved the growth of the characters. the dynamic between them and the flow of the story. the realistic events made me stop and think about how my life is and the differences there are between struggles like these and our struggles. Looking forward to reading more by this author for sure!

BOOK REPORT for Little Universes by Heather Demetrios

Cover Story: Out of This World
BFF Charm: Let Me Love You x 2
Swoonworthy Scale: 7
Talky Talk: She Says, She Says
Bonus Factors: Sisters, Science
Factors: Addiction, Grief
Relationship Status: LYLAS

Trigger Warnings: This book deals with depression and opiate addiction, as well as suicidal thoughts and attempts. There is also a mention of a possible nonconsensual sexual encounter.

Cover Story: Out of This World

Unexpected illustrated cover, since Heather Demetrios hasn't had one since her very first book, which was in a much different style. But Chung-Yun Yoo's artwork is GLORIOUS. Hannah and Mae are front and centre, as they should be, and I love how Hannah's dark hair doubles as the galaxy sky. (That doesn't feel like the right term, but I'm not an aspiring astronaut like Mae.)

The Deal:

The Winters sisters are as different as can be: science-y and studious Mae, and directionless and distant Hannah. But when a family tragedy uproots them from Los Angeles to Boston, all they basically have is each other -- and the growing secrecy and separation between them.

BFF Charm: Let Me Love You x 2

OOF, these poor girls. Not only does my heart break for them for what happens to their parents, but then it keeps breaking and breaking for everything else. (My hardest cries actually had nothing to do with that inciting incident, and I am notably Not A Crier.)

My propensity for SHOUTING IN CAPS is incredibly on point for once, as it's a behaviour also exhibited by Mae. She's rational and stoic to the point of emotional constipation, and she has a fixer mentality even when confronted with a current reality that cannot be fixed. She can't help it that her love language is providing solutions! (Or, in Mae speak, working the problem.) (I find her so relatable that I honestly could not be more called out unless her chapters were taken directly from my own journal.)

But Mae also has deep-rooted fears of being unlovable and left behind by everybody she loves. As a fellow science nerd, I'd like to remind Mae that correlation does not imply causation! She is, of course, so worthy of love. And nothing proves that more than her love for her sister. Mae has the thankless role of being her sister's keeper, which means her heart's in the right place even if her actions are not. To be fair, she has to look after her sister while also being a grieving 17-year-old girl herself. It's a lot! Maybe even TOO MUCH!

Sigh, poor Hannah. All she truly wants in life is to be happy, but everything is... off. When we meet her, Hannah as a tarot-loving free spirit who turns every room into a dance floor is already a distant memory. Present-day Hannah thinks her existence is a constant disappointment; she never feels like she's never enough. She calls herself an open wound, which is an unfortunately apt comparison: she's hurting and she's not healing. She's lashing out at everyone, inflicting as much pain as she's feeling. ('Hurt people hurt people' would be my clichéd phrase for her.) Most tragic of all, this is only scratching the surface of Hannah's depression. Her story might seem heavy -- and it is -- but trust me, you can carry it.

Swoonworthy Scale: 7

Hannah's longtime boyfriend Micah adores her, but that pull of first love might not be enough to keep them together -- and that was even before they lived on opposite ends of the country. And before she met Drew, who accepts both her dark and light sides -- naturally, since he looks like a bad boy vampire. However, Drew is also sooooort of, maybe, OK actually Hannah's drug dealer. It's definitely not a great meet cute, but I was eventually able to overcome my deep skepticism of this dubious origin. (Believe me, I was VERY VERY SKEPTICAL.)

Ben, on the other hand, is a geophysics nerd who looks like he walked right out of Bleach aka Mae's favourite manga aka SHE HAS NO CHANCE against his charms and also absolutely NO CHILL. Total nerd bliss -- if Mae wasn't so afraid of letting someone get close to her, anyway.

Talky Talk: She Says, She Says

The narration switches between Mae and Hannah, with a few detours interspersed throughout. Mae's inner dialogue treads a very fine line with how science-y it is, but there's a genuine sense of how she lives and breathes all things astronautics without being too complicated for someone without that background to understand. Mae's chapters also tend to have more levity than Hannah's, which are full of fury and despair; there's definitely no confusion between the sisters' distinct voices.

Hannah's chapters are often preceded by her acorns: "They're more like secrets I whisper to the whole world." She leaves messages wherever she goes and whenever she has an inspiration -- on elevators, benches, food wrappers, anything -- which offer concise and unfiltered insight into her state of mind. The book also includes occasional excerpts from their dad's work, which is pretty much philosophy disguised as theoretical physics (although he probably would have argued that the two are intertwined).

Bonus Factor: Sisters

The sisterly dynamic is a little uncommon in that Mae and Hannah are the same age without being twins. (Mae was adopted; Hannah was not.) Both feel like the other hogs up all the attention in the family: Mae, for being a brainiac genius; and Hannah, for needing to be handled delicately. While Mae worries that she'll never truly belong in the family due to her lack of blood relation, Hannah has the same concern of ostracization because she feels like a perpetual screw-up. Their insecurities seem contradictory but actually make perfect sense because of how easy Demetrios makes it to empathize with both girls.

Bonus Factor: Science

Mae's made it her life's mission to become an astronaut, and the next step is getting into a naval military academy for the aviation experience that NASA looks for. She also gravitates towards fellow science-y types, like her dad who was a big name theoretical physicist, her cousin Nate who's studying astronautical engineering at MIT, and, of course, Nate's roommate and future geophysicist Ben.

Factor: Addiction

Hannah started using opiates long before this traumatic time in her life, and the current circumstances have not helped her maintain her sobriety. That's the thing about recovery: it's an active choice that you have to make, and you have to constantly keep making it. Some days are easier than others, and some days are really fucking hard.

Factor: Grief

Living with grief and trauma is unfortunately all too relatable these days. Mourning can be a complicated process, especially if you have trouble reconciling memories with the imperfect truth of who someone really was. Maybe you find solace in the simplest of things, like Mae and Hannah do with their mother's tradition of making soup. Or maybe you take up meditating like Mae to let go of everything that's beyond your control. We can't change the past, but we can try to be the best version of ourselves in honour of everything in the universe that conspired together to make us just as we are at this exact moment. (This would probably be much more uplifting if there wasn't an ongoing global pandemic.)

Relationship Status: LYLAS

Yes, I'm the ridiculous person who can look forward to a book for months and yet still end up massively late for our date. But fortunately, when you love someone like family, they'll forgive you anyway. Just like I'll forgive this book for all the UNCONTROLLABLE SOBBING that it caused. Maybe books just hit differently in a pandemic, but it's more likely that Little Universes is full of BIG MESSY BEAUTIFUL EMOTIONS.

This book was absolutely fantastic. I've already added it to our library collection on preorder and will recommend it to students.

This book is a lot to unpack. We follow the lives of Hannah and Mae as they deal with the aftermath of the tsunami that killed their parents. Hannah is a struggling addict in recovery and Mae has her sights set on becoming an astronaut. I remember reading the author’s note and it said something about this book being a lifetime in the making, and I thought that was kind of beautiful because it really feels like this book spans a lifetime (though in reality it’s only about a year?).

This book comes with an abundance of content warnings and I would recommend looking them up before grabbing this story. It deals with some very heavy topics, which are only worsened after the wave.

I just really loved how this story showed the bond between sisters, how they dealt individually with the trauma, and how they came together to grow. There is so much that happens in this book – relationships, boys, moving to across the country, discovering secrets…the list goes on. While it is a bit of a heavy read, there are so many moments of light and love.

I did struggle a bit during Mae’s perspective sometimes. She is incredibly smart – much smarter than I am – and tends to speak in formulas and intense scientific explanations that I struggled to follow. I found myself skimming those bits. But it was definitely interesting to see how she applies math and science to every day life and sorting through her emotions.

I found myself enjoying Hannah’s parts of the story more, just for the ease of readability. Her sections are full of emotion, passion, and pain. She truly undergoes so much growth throughout the story, and it isn’t always easy.

Overall, this story really left an impression on me. It was a little difficult to get engaged in the beginning, but by the end, I didn’t want it to be over. There are some books that just suck you in and take you on an epic journey, and this was one of them.

This was a cute YA book that I buddy read with my best at the start of Covid outbreak! Thanks to Fierce reads for sending us this title. I've only read one of Heather Demetrios' books before, a few years back and I remember really liking it. I'd say that I may have been a bit too old to read this book, as the writing really was geared for young adults, but I still rather enjoyed myself.

This is an amazing book and I highly recommend it. There are trigger warnings that someone may want to be aware of prior to reading this book due to its content. In all the story was very well written and well mapped out, the characters or extremely well developed, and overall I really enjoyed this authors word and I look forward to reading more by them!

I actually quit this book because I wasn't in the right mood for it at the time.

I don't have any issues, and intend to give it another try in the very near future!

Full review to come!

I absolutely adored this book -- as with all of Demetrios' work it was at times funny, deeply sad, incredibly heartfelt and very moving. It's not easy being a sister, and reading about these two was a punch in the gut at times, but I wouldn't trade the experience for the world.

I enjoyed reading several aspects of this book! The pacing was wonderful, characters were well drawn, and the reading experience on the whole was delightful.

I really enjoyed Little Universes The characters were really well written and the plot kept me interested. I thought the writing was also really well done. This is not my first Heather Demetrios book and it definitely won't be the last. I also purchased a copy for my classroom and my students love it!

DNFed. Unfortunately, the story just didn't do anything for me. I like what it was trying to go for, but I didn't feel anything while reading.

I didn't like this book at all. It was not for me, didn't work. It's like any contemporary released before. Nothing new, sorry.

First I want to start by saying that I enjoyed reading this book. I liked the writing style and the plot was good as well. Most big events in Little Universes were a little rushed or skipped entirely, so I think it was mostly focused on how it affected the characters afterwards. I usually like this a lot, because this way you can really connect with the characters, but this sadly didn’t happen for me. At the beginning I really thought this was going to be an emotional rollercoaster, but for some reason it wasn’t. I didn’t cry when they cried or hurt when they hurt.
I did get it, but I didn't really feel their pain.

Well, I just got done reading this and sitting in a long-cold bubble bath sobbing my face off. Because it is that good. I highlighted giant chunks of the thing because both the writing and the messages were just so damned beautiful.

Sisters Mae and Hannah have just lost their parents in a horrific tsunami, and have absolutely no idea how to move forward. Because who would, honestly? Mae is incredibly science and logic focused, which makes her grieving even more difficult, as there is no logic in grief. Hannah had been struggling with drug use since before their deaths, and obviously the loss of her parents shattered her even further, and sent her spiraling even more.

As they move across the country to live with their (incredibly loving) aunt, uncle, and cousin, they have to figure out how to rebuild. And there is a lot going on in both girls' lives beyond just the loss of their parents. Mae needs to decide if she can and should leave her sister to follow her lifelong dream of being an astronaut, or if she needs to change her trajectory. She finds a great friend in her cousin Nate, and Nate's friend Ben who is kind of the best and also kind of more than a friend. Hannah is recovering from an abortion that she isn't sure she wanted to have, in addition to the addiction. She's pulled from her long-time boyfriend Micah, and feels more alone than ever. She also finds out a secret about their parents that is eating away at her as she tries to spare her sister the pain.

There are so many tremendous side characters in this book, not all of whom I can even mention for fear of spoilers. I loved that the girls had so many supports (and they both acknowledge that they are quite lucky, too) especially in their family who were willing to step up to help them through this. They not only need to learn to navigate these new relationships (or rather, closer relationships) with extended family, but their new normals with each other.

And look, this book is heavy. It isn't a quick or easy read. But it just so lovely, so full of heart, and at the end of the day, so hopeful, that it is completely worth the journey.

Bottom Line: It's a story about the triumph and resilience of the human spirit against all odds. It's love overcoming death, and there's nothing greater than that.

**Trigger warning for death, grief, abortion, assault, attempted suicide, drug addiction/overdose

This book surprised me in the best way. It had everything I was craving at this moment: siblings, romance, struggles.
I especially loved how closely knitted the characters were. Despite their differences and their own stories, I could really relate to all of them, and I loved seeing their growth.
This book dealt with some heavy topics, and in my opinion, that was done in a good way. I could imagine myself feeling like the characters felt in certain situations, which is not easy as a writer to do, I can imagine.
I can highly recommend this book.

This book was beautiful. I was very emotional while reading it. I am very close to my four sisters so the sibling relationship really resonated with me. I openly cried over parts of this book. It was just really heart wrenching and moving.

“What is the most important thing? To love yourself and the world. In that order.” Yoko Ono
This. Wrecked. Me. I connected a lot with the story and have felt or experienced similar situations. Because of this, I probably felt more than most. At the same time, it is so well written, I think it’s impossible not to feel what the author wants you to. The grief and pain was so real it was tangible.
Part of me wants to give this 5 stars. Part of me wants to give it 2. It was difficult to read. It’s heavy, but it’s beautiful. Heartbreaking isn’t a word that describes it well enough. I feel like my heart was beat on multiple times but I also feel I’m better for reading it. There is insight for everyone to grasp and apply to their own lives. I wasn’t fully prepared for it, it puts you in a place of self reflection and brings deep thoughts about life.
The writing is amazing and almost poetic. It was definitely the best part of the book. Demetrios has an incredible talent that should only be used for books with profound, thoughtful content. “Love is the constant.” was the underlying theme of the book and I respect and admire the author for being able to do that so well.

The content was very high for language, drugs and had very mature situations. A lot of the content, in my opinion, is not YA appropriate. Because of that, I don't feel I could give it 5 stars. There are many triggers such as abortion, suicide, addiction, infidelity and death. Check my website (link in bio) for the full details on content.

I buddy read this book with my friend Belle and when she pitched it to me, it sounded a lot less harmless than what it actually was. Despite how much I connected to this book in not-so-great ways, I still finished the book and really, really enjoyed it. The writing was easy to get into at first, then took some adjusting to (the science-y stuff got a bit too much, even for a nerd like me), but by the 20% mark I was just flying through this book. As an older sister who’s been in similar situations as Mae, I got it. I really, really got it. I cried about four times while reading this, remembering the hard times with my sister and appreciating the bond between Mae and Hannah. The characters were real, they were raw, and the author did a great job of making them so incredibly human. This is the first contemporary novel that I’ve finished in two years and I’m pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. 4/5 stars.

*Thank you to Belle for letting me read this with you, and the publishers who suggested she share the ARC with a friend. The sisters buddy read is such a cute idea!