Spoilers Below

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Lizzy and the Good Luck Girl

Synopsis

Lizzy and The Good Luck Girl was a lot of things, but first of all, it was cute, it had cats and friendship and luck and it was just a sweet read. 

Twelve-year-old Lizzy Sherman lives in the small town of East Thumb, Maine, upstairs from her family’s diner. She tries to keep her eye out for signs, things that will warn her of good or bad luck so she can have a problem-free existence.

She pays attention to everything from clouds in the sky to juice on the floor spilled in the shape of a heart. If she can figure out what theses signs mean, she’ll know what to do next and know how to keep herself and her family safe.

When Lizzy and her best friend Joss go search for a stray cat, they find a runaway girl instead. When Lizzy notices a tiny four-leaf clover tattooed on the girl’s hand, she knows it’s a sign.

She dreams up a plan to hide the girl in her bedroom closet convinced that the girl will be able to protect her family from tragedy. But signs aren’t always what they seem and the girl may have something more valuable to offer than luck. 

Review

Okay, Joss and Lizzy’s are really sweet and the whole idea of selling cat sweaters is a great (if misguided) one. I mean, it’s pointed out throughout the book that cats are not sweater wearers. But they come to a solution eventually, and their earnest attempt to try and help the animals of their community is sweet. Even if they have things a bit wrong at first.

Joss and Lizzy also can’t help but help Charlotte, the runaway girl. The plot of her living in Lizzy’s closet would only work in a book. But it’s sweet and the way the two bond over being in shared space really makes the heart of the story. 

I also really love when Joss teaches Charlotte how to knit and she helps with the sweaters. 

The whole concept of signs is really important throughout the book, but I think what’s more important is how easily they can be misinterpreted. Lizzy takes the clover on Charlotte’s hand as good luck, Charlotte thinks Lizzy is good luck. Things happen when people leave or things don’t go as planned, but as Lizzy finds out it’s more how you respond to the curveballs life throws at you than trying to predict every little thing.

Though it’s never mentioned by name I think Lizzy has a little bit of OCD or PTSD, related to a car accident her family got into. Her thing with signs could be simply a deep focus on superstition but it’s the emotional value she places on them that makes me think its something more.

Lizzy has OCD and PTSD sign of wanting to be in control of everything. She also has a bit of self-blame for the accident her family got into, leading me towards the OCD route, since thinking you can control everything is often a symptom of OCD. I’m not saying she has a full diagnosis, it could simply be related to the accident that happened with her family. Later in the book especially after a conversation she has, she’s able to let things go a little bit. 

In the end, I think Lizzy is simply trying to control things because she hasn’t had a chance to talk about what happened with her family and their car wreck. Meeting Charlotte and getting a chance to talk things out finally give her the emotional freedom she’s been searching for, she also does the same thing for Charlotte with her issues with her family, resulting in a happy ending for both parties. \

Overall this was a cute book, it had some serious themes and a few bits of plot that would only work in a book, but I’d give it a solid 4 stars!

Amazon: Lizzy and the Good Luck Girl

Photo by Djalma Paiva Armelin from Pexels