Colin Singleton just graduated from high school and got dumped by a girl named Katherine for the nineteenth time. Ever since he began dating, his girlfriends have have only been named Katherine, and it has to be spelled exactly like that, and she can't go by a nickname like Kat or anything. But weird dating type aside, Colin is no ordinary boy. He is a prodigy, and has always been super-smart. He tries to read 400 pages a day, and he learns facts like crazy. Unfortunately, prodigies are not so cool forever, and Colin is beginning to figure this out for himself. If you're a genius, you invent things, and you're brilliant into your adult life. But prodigies...well, Colin feels like they never do anything really special. You get to be that ten-year-old who knows everything, but by the time you hit college, you're just like everyone else, and it sucks, since for your whole childhood you were called special and brilliant, and now...now you're not. And to make matters worse, this most recent Katherine who dumped him...well, he was actually in love with her. He knew that it was more than just a crush, more than the feelings he had for Katherines throughout elementary school, middle school, and the early years of high school. He is heartbroken, depressed, and feels useless. So when his friend Hassan Harbish shows up at his house shortly after the terrible dumping and offers to take Colin on a road trip to dispel his misery and perhaps find a new purpose, Colin readily agrees. The boys soon head out of their hometown of Chicago and find themselves in Gutshot, Tennessee, a little town that claims to contain the grave of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Colin and Hassan meet a girl named Lindsey Lee Wells, whose mom, Hollis, offers the boys the job of interviewing Gutshot residents to compile an oral history, and in exchange, she will pay them $500 per week and give them room and board at her house. Between interviewing, Colin is trying to come up with a formula he calls the Theorem of Underlying Katherine Predictability, which is supposed to show the progression of a relationship, and could also be used, Colin believes, to predict the future. At the same time, he's trying to convince Hassan to go to college. His friend has "taken a year off" and that one year looks like it may turn into two if Hassan isn't careful. While spending the summer in Gutshot, Colin discovers many things about Katherines, the Theorem, being a nearly-former prodigy, and the way he loves.
Paper Towns was my first John Green book. I thought that such a popular author could not be any good, since most of the time, I cannot stand the bestsellers in the YA section of the bookstore (e.g., The Hunger Games. I know, I know--I don't like The Hunger Games. I'm sorry, everyone). But my friend (who also doesn't much like The Hunger Games) gave me Paper Towns as a birthday present, and I was utterly amazed. I had no idea that John Green wrote about such deep ideas as philosophies of life! What? This was new to me. It's been almost a year since I read Paper Towns, and since then, the only Green book I've read has been An Abundance of Katherines. From what I've seen, AAoK is one of his less popular books, but I really enjoyed it.
Colin Singleton just graduated from high school and got dumped by a girl named Katherine for the nineteenth time. Ever since he began dating, his girlfriends have have only been named Katherine, and it has to be spelled exactly like that, and she can't go by a nickname like Kat or anything. But weird dating type aside, Colin is no ordinary boy. He is a prodigy, and has always been super-smart. He tries to read 400 pages a day, and he learns facts like crazy. Unfortunately, prodigies are not so cool forever, and Colin is beginning to figure this out for himself. If you're a genius, you invent things, and you're brilliant into your adult life. But prodigies...well, Colin feels like they never do anything really special. You get to be that ten-year-old who knows everything, but by the time you hit college, you're just like everyone else, and it sucks, since for your whole childhood you were called special and brilliant, and now...now you're not. And to make matters worse, this most recent Katherine who dumped him...well, he was actually in love with her. He knew that it was more than just a crush, more than the feelings he had for Katherines throughout elementary school, middle school, and the early years of high school. He is heartbroken, depressed, and feels useless. So when his friend Hassan Harbish shows up at his house shortly after the terrible dumping and offers to take Colin on a road trip to dispel his misery and perhaps find a new purpose, Colin readily agrees. The boys soon head out of their hometown of Chicago and find themselves in Gutshot, Tennessee, a little town that claims to contain the grave of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. Colin and Hassan meet a girl named Lindsey Lee Wells, whose mom, Hollis, offers the boys the job of interviewing Gutshot residents to compile an oral history, and in exchange, she will pay them $500 per week and give them room and board at her house. Between interviewing, Colin is trying to come up with a formula he calls the Theorem of Underlying Katherine Predictability, which is supposed to show the progression of a relationship, and could also be used, Colin believes, to predict the future. At the same time, he's trying to convince Hassan to go to college. His friend has "taken a year off" and that one year looks like it may turn into two if Hassan isn't careful. While spending the summer in Gutshot, Colin discovers many things about Katherines, the Theorem, being a nearly-former prodigy, and the way he loves.
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When I was in fourth grade or fifth grade or something, I read The Apothecary. A few years later, I was appalled to discover that I remembered next to nothing about it—odd, considering that I remember books very well, especially ones that I liked. And I liked The Apothecary. And yet despite all of my usual tendencies, I remembered nothing except that it took place in postwar London, the main character was named Janie, there was a guy named Pip, and at some point some people turned into birds. Wow. One of the worst story recalls of my life. It was a little confusing, but that sort of thing has never deterred me or caused such a lack of memory. And so, after a couple of years of gazing in agitation at the gray volume reposing on my shelf in the M section (for Meloy), I finally picked it up again last month.
It's February 1952, and 14-year-old Janie Scott lives a normal life in California. But then strange men start following her home, and her family discovers that they are being followed by the American government, who thinks they might be communists. The Scotts are forced to move to London, and Janie doesn't know what to do, uprooted from everything she'd ever known and taken to a foreign city, enrolling at a school where she has to take Latin, a language she speaks not a word of. It seems like everyone hates her--the first student she met was Sarah Pennington, rich, privileged, and gorgeous, who keeps saying "This is Jane Scott from California," like the state is fictitious or something. The Latin teacher, Mr. Danby, is nice, though, and Janie feels a bit better knowing that there is a Russian kid at school, Sergei Shiskin, who's probably having an even worse time than she is. But during her first day at lunch, they have a bomb drill, and the only person who refuses to go under the cafeteria tables because he claims they will offer no protection is Benjamin Burrows, son of a local apothecary who wants more than anything to become a spy. Janie and Benjamin become friends over chess in the park, where Benjamin sits and watches people. He has become suspicious of a particular man. But then strange things start happening--Benjamin's father is kidnapped. A man is murdered with a sundial. A mysterious book called the Pharmacopoeia falls into Janie and Benjamin's hands, and the quest to find the missing apothecary and find out what his real work is begins. |
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August 2017
AuthorI am Fiona, a 16-year-old person. I write reviews of books that I read. I love reading, writing, spoonerisms, word jokes, accents, In Which chapters, parentheses, long dashes, et ceteras, and acronyms. Categories
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