This is book #1 for my little brother and book #5 for me out of the 18 Rick Riordan Presents books! Basically, to get my little brother to read chapter books, although he does read comic books and while that’s great, I want to challenge his brain a little bit and he has agreed on the deal that after we finish all 18 RR presents books, we do a YT video to rank them, he has to read an RR presents books and I have to read it as well. Seeing as I have read 4 beforehand Sal and Gabi Break the Universe is my 5th and probably tied with City of the Plague God by Sarwat Chadda in terms of favourites. The funny thing is, I got the book on my Kobo and gave it to my little brother and he instantly comes to me saying

a) He really really liked the book and I should also buy him the second one right away and “can you please get me a physical copy of this one? I will read it much faster” (which he did, he finished the book in 9 days) 

b) He then comes to me and the first thing he says about the book is “there’s a funny word here that they use instead of BS” and proceeds to show me the word “cacaseca” which, you guessed it, means “dry poop”.  I honestly didn’t even blink twice because what more do you expect from a 9-year-old kid than one laughing about the poop joke. 

After my little brother read it, he told me his rating would be 4 stars (which is up on my Goodreads!). Then when I started reading it and told him how much fun I was having, he agreed (which made my reader heart very happy that he liked a chapter book!) and asked me to change his rating from 4 stars to 5 stars!

Here’s a quick overview of his review:

Things he liked:
- Cacaseca joke (typical)
- He liked Sal more than Gabi (not surprising)
- He thought Sal's powers were cool
- He liked that Gabi had a baby brother
- He liked the nickname Iggy
That's it :)

Here’s my review (which is frankly, a little longer haha)

I thought the characters were really awesome. I really liked the diabetes rep because Sal has diabetes and my best friend does too and every time he mentioned him having to check and carrying around his diabetes bag, it reminded me of how my friend would always bring candy to class (or something sweet like grapes).  I really loved the Spanish bits even though, half the time I didn’t understand anything (I speak French, not Spanish but they’re both romance languages so not far off).

 I really liked the science part. Sal’s dad is a calamity physicist and while I am not good at math or science, the whole “Sal can rip holes in the universe and pull things out” thing was explained quite easily. I really liked how Sal had a good relationship with his stepmom (she was called American Stepmom)  because usually, stepmother’s are portrayed as evil (maybe this is because we all grew up on those gruesome Grimm brothers fairy tales) and/or always trying to replace the mom (which thankfully the American Stepmom decided to not do and made it clear to Sal)

In addition to that, I found it funny how Gabi had so many Dads and how sweet they all were to Gabi and her mom and of course her little brother Iggy (but I won’t say more than that because otherwise, that would be very big spoilers). We actually don’t know who Gabi’s real dad is but hey, 6 dads is cool too! They’re all a big family and I definitely vibed with that. 

Even as a 19-year old (basically an adult?) I thought the sense of humour (and of course an honorary mention to the cacaseca and other poop jokes) were pretty spot on. Sal and Gabi are both in 8th grade (they are 13 years old) and the friendship between them (going from enemies to friends really) was really sweet and they both grew together as friends and as characters. I honestly don’t think I have read such good middle-grade in such a long time (most MG books I have read are usually part of a longer series, 3-5 books) and so since the Sal and Gabi series is only a duology, there was meant to be very significant character development and I honestly think that Hernandez nailed it because this book is fricking awesome and was SUCH a joy to read. Culeco (the school) seems like such a fun place to be and honestly, even though I am a fairly shy person, I would probably be like Gabi: running something like a newspaper and being very knowledgeable because let’s be real, I am a nerd (and I am proud of it!) 

Overall, this book was really fun and awesome and I highly recommend it if you want a fast read (don’t be fooled by the 400 pages because it is super fast-paced and I finished it in two days)