Cliff Hubbard is a huge loser. Literally. His nickname at Happy Valley High School is Neanderthal because he’s so enormous-6’6” and 250 pounds to be exact. He has nobody at school, and life in his trailer-park home has gone from bad to worse ever since his older brother’s suicide. There’s no one Cliff hates more than the nauseatingly cool quarterback, Aaron Zimmerman. Then Aaron returns to school … school after a near-death experience with a bizarre claim: while he was unconscious he saw God, who gave him a list of things to do to make Happy Valley High suck less. And God said there’s only one person who can help: Neanderthal.
To his own surprise, Cliff says he’s in. As he and Aaron make their way through the List, which involves a vindictive English teacher, a mysterious computer hacker, a decidedly unchristian cult of Jesus Teens, the local drug dealers, and the meanest bully at HVHS, Cliff feels like he’s part of something for the first time since losing his brother. But fixing a broken school isn’t as simple as it seems, and just when Cliff thinks they’ve completed the List, he realizes their mission hits closer to home than he ever imagined.
Razor sharp, moving, and outrageously funny, Neanderthal Opens the Door to the Universe is an unforgettable story of finding your place in an imperfect world.
more
I absolutely loved this book! I bought it for my grandson and thought I’d just peak to see what it was about and I was hooked. Fabulous book for young adults!
Cliff is big (REALLY big) and angry (SO MUCH ANGER) and feels like a total outsider whose life is out of control. His dad is a monster. His brother is dead. His mom isn’t helping with either situation. School suuuuuuucks.
Aaron is The Golden Boy, so of course he and Cliff have traded face punches. Cliff has plans to end Aaron after the latest incident, but misses his chance because Mr. Football Star has an accident and almost dies. Can’t really pummel someone who came back from the dead, right?
Then Aaron shows up at school to tell Cliff that God spoke to him during the coma, gave him a list of things to do with Cliff–VERY SPECIFICALLY CLIFF– as his partner. Things that will fix the mess that is their high school.
These also happen to be things that Cliff hates about their school/community.
How can Cliff say no?
And so begins a dive into the mind of a teenager who is dealing with a lot, who has blinders on about some things, and is deeply passionate about others.
While Cliff and Aaron get to work, they begin to better understand their classmates, friends, families, and themselves. You will laugh and cry and FEEL SO MANY THINGS. Mostly very glad you picked this book up.
(Definitely upper teenagery due to frank content about sex, drugs, suicide, violence, and more.)
Even though theres alot of swear words, sexual stuff, and LGBTQ, it is really funny and wont let you put the book down. At the end of the book you would want to read it again and it will teach you things that probably no one will tell you about.
The characters in this novel are utterly believable throughout the complex otherworldly story with its feet firmly anchored in the gritty reality of high school, and layered with repeated heartwrenching revelations. Loved it!
A story that could be true about the modern American high school.
Preston Norton brings an exciting, sharp voice to YA. NEANDERTHAL is both heartbreaking and hopeful.
Touching, funny, and utterly unforgettable.
What a great book! I loved from the first page to the last. I highly recommend itA!
I bought this book on a lark. I read the excerpt, cracked up, and thought “this sounds like fun.” I had no other expectations and I don’t usually read stories with male protagonists. But this was exceptional. Not in a literary, eloquent, poetic style, but a real, in-your-face, honest look at people’s emotions and questions about life. My heart ached for Cliff and his brother and his family situation, the never-ending suffering at school, his own self-loathing. The story takes you on a journey of angst and wicked humor mixed with hope and some deep soul-searching. And touching . . . I wasn’t expecting that at all. Preston Norton has some amazing storytelling skills. Go on. Try it. I dare you to not love this book.
Cliff, dubbed Neanderthal by his schoolmates, is having a rough time of it. He lost his best friend and brother to suicide. When the story opens he responds to cruelty with violence. The object of one such encounter is Aaron who appears to have the world on a string. Arron has a boating accident where he is in a coma and receives a to-do list from God that he is instructed to accomplish with his nemesis, Neanderthal. We learn why people can act cruelly and how to overcome. Great story where a mystery is solved. Loved it!