I have done it!
I have finished all four John Green books. (I'm not counting his collabs, because I haven't read any of those yet.) The last one that was left for me to read was An Abundance of Katherines.
Let me start by saying that this may be my second favorite John Green book, after The Fault in Our Stars. It was really funny and witty and I just really liked the story.
So basically, this is the story of a boy named Colin. Colin is a senior in high school and he has just been dumped by the 19th Katherine in a row. Because you see, whereas other boys have types of girls they like such as blondes or brunettes, Colin likes girls named Katherine, with a K. And now, at the end of senior year, Katherine the 19th, or K19, has left him.
To heal (or attempt to patch up, at least) Colin's broken heart, his best friend Hassan takes him on a road trip to nowhere. They end up in Gutshot, Tennessee, looking for the grave of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand (you may have heard of him, he's the one who sparked one of the biggest wars this world has ever seen). They end up meeting a girl named Lindsey and staying at her house after her mother offers them a job collecting stories about Gutshot from the residents.
Colin, however, is finding it hard to focus on local gossip, because you see, Colin is a former child-prodigy. He is very smart, very good at remembering things and very upset that he hasn't made the transition from "prodigy" (someone who is good at learning things) to "genius" (someone who is good at thinking up new things). Desperate to matter, to be remembered, Colin decides that his mark on the world will be a mathematical formula that can invariably predict the outcome of a romantic relationship.
The reasons that I liked this book are as follows.
I liked the characters. I like "John Green's formula" as people call it, the fact that most of his books have a nerdy, quirky boy with the funny best friend, who falls in love with a popular, mysterious girl. I know a lot of people criticize that but I do like it. So Colin. Not an overly likable character. You honestly can't blame the Katherines for dumping him. He's self-centered, very focused on his own intelligence, and yet that's why he's a good character, because how many authors can successfully pull off a smart, self-centered main character and still make the story progress without completely changing who he is? Hassan, the funny best friend, is indeed very funny. I like him. His character doesn't have a lot of depth, he's comic relief, but he's good at what he does. Lindsey, I thought, was a nicely 3-D character. She had several faces, which I liked because don't we all? She was flawed, but not so much that the book focused on it.
I liked the story, and the setting, because it was the perfect place for stereotypes and John Green did not fall into the trap at all.
Finally, it's a feel good book. It's not great literature, it won't make you rethink your life, but it's time well spent. It made me read under the desk in class and stay up late at night to read "just to the end of the chapter", which I haven't done in so long and felt so good. So, if like me, you are recovering from a reading hiatus, this is a good book to get you back into reading. If you aren't on a book hiatus, good for you! You should read this if you need a break from the other drama-filled, heavy with sadness, YA books.
That's all for now!
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