Looking For Alaska, John Green

This week before I left my family and Florida and the rest of my minor life to go to boarding school in Alabama, my mother insisted on throwing me a going-away party.

Finally, Looking For Alaska showed up at the school library, and was immediately snapped up by me. It's the story of Miles Halter shows up at a boarding school in Alabama to seek what Rabelais called "the Great Perhaps". You see, he's fascinated with last words; he memorizes them. At the Culver Creek, he meets Alaska Young, a crazy and attractive girl, as well as some other very strange people. They do some pretty strange things.

That's John Green for you. I liked this one a bit better than An Abundance of Katherines, but I still think Paper Towns and The Fault in Our Stars were both much better books; more thoughtful, though obviously this one attempts to be. Looking for Alaska is kind of funny, though, and certainly I did want to know what would happen. Also the "x number of days before" was very dramatic. It's a very John Greenish book, if you know what I mean. There's a lot of smoking and drinking.

Alaska is seriously disturbed. All of them are, actually. I really wanted to like this book, but I couldn't get into the first half of  the book, "the before" Somehow, it wasn't really engaging or gripping or any of those things that make you love a book. But then the big thing happened. And then the book was amazing. It feels like all of the other stuff is just a build-up to what happens after. It's pretty easy to guess, but without spoiling anything, Miles is kind of grappling with his grief and also his overwhelming feeling of guilt. And there are some really nice thoughts and there is some really great writing here. The first half was a bit boring, but the second made up for it a lot. Stick with this one. And yes, the last three pages are amazing.

Read Looking For Alaska:

• if you like John Green
• if you like realistic (?) fiction

221 pages.

Very Good! I would recommend this book!