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A review by duffypratt
Paper Towns by John Green
3.0
I found myself reading another John Green book, after The Fault in Our Stars, much sooner than I expected. In some ways, I think this is a better book than Fault. It's less manipulative, and relies less on simply being clever. And yet, while I could see ways that it was better, I enjoyed Fault a little more. I admit the possibility, however, that I might have enjoyed this one more if I had read it first.
Here's an example why that might be true: I fell in love with the narration in Fault on either page two or three when the narrator describes someone's history as "cancertastic". The love turned out to be infatuation, and it completely wore off when a character in this book describes something as being "nerdtastic." It turns out that in Fault he was cribbing from himself. But because I read that book first, I felt like he was cheating here and not there, if that makes any sense. Being a bit of a nerd myself, I just looked up a few online dictionaries for "-tastic" as a suffix, and sure enough, it now is one. But it was new to me, and I'm willing to bet that Green is among the first to slap it on either Cancer or Nerd. But I still felt cheated. And I think the reason why is because I was thinking of the people in these books as different people, but Green didn't try hard enough to make them talk differently. (Also, I'm willing to be chastised by any teens out there who will confirm that -tastic has actually become common usage among nerdy teens, or cancer ridden teens).
Another problem I had here was again Green proved to be overly literary. This book is haunted by the specters of Walt Whitman and Captain Ahab. At times, I felt like the narrative was devolving into a literary exegesis of Song of Myself. Not that there's anything wrong with that in principle. But it also felt way out of character for the narrator to puzzle through this poem with such obsession. In some ways, that poem is the ocean where the main character navigates his ship, in search of his own White Whale, in the form of Margo Speigleman.
I rather liked the narrative structure. It's a triptych. The first part follows the narrator and Margo on a night of adventure - 11 adventures to be precise. She drags him out in the middle of the night to assist her with getting some revenge on her ex-boyfriend and other ex-friends. This part was light and enjoyable.
Part two involves the disappearance of Margo, and the narrator's search for her, which takes him, mostly, into the afore-mentioned analysis of Song of Myself. This part worked decently, especially at the start, where it took the shape of an actual mystery. Eventually, the mystery became nothing but an exercise in self-pity, and I didn't like it so much. I did like the developments with the two "side-kicks": Ben and Radar. And the climax, during prom night was good (but a bit more subdued than Carrie, for example)
Part Three is an extended road trip that takes place instead of graduation. Put six kids into a minivan for twenty hours and what do you get? A whole lot of nothing here. In Fault, I thought the characters had way too much interesting to say to each other. Green goes to the opposite extreme here. Twenty hours together, and the most interesting thing any of them have to say is "I have to pee." It was good for a few laughs, but ultimately I thought this third part was both diverting and pointless.
All this was followed by a fairly touching coda, which redeemed some of the failings I saw earlier. I did like this book, but now I'm pretty sure that I won't lightly be picking up another Green book soon.
Here's an example why that might be true: I fell in love with the narration in Fault on either page two or three when the narrator describes someone's history as "cancertastic". The love turned out to be infatuation, and it completely wore off when a character in this book describes something as being "nerdtastic." It turns out that in Fault he was cribbing from himself. But because I read that book first, I felt like he was cheating here and not there, if that makes any sense. Being a bit of a nerd myself, I just looked up a few online dictionaries for "-tastic" as a suffix, and sure enough, it now is one. But it was new to me, and I'm willing to bet that Green is among the first to slap it on either Cancer or Nerd. But I still felt cheated. And I think the reason why is because I was thinking of the people in these books as different people, but Green didn't try hard enough to make them talk differently. (Also, I'm willing to be chastised by any teens out there who will confirm that -tastic has actually become common usage among nerdy teens, or cancer ridden teens).
Another problem I had here was again Green proved to be overly literary. This book is haunted by the specters of Walt Whitman and Captain Ahab. At times, I felt like the narrative was devolving into a literary exegesis of Song of Myself. Not that there's anything wrong with that in principle. But it also felt way out of character for the narrator to puzzle through this poem with such obsession. In some ways, that poem is the ocean where the main character navigates his ship, in search of his own White Whale, in the form of Margo Speigleman.
I rather liked the narrative structure. It's a triptych. The first part follows the narrator and Margo on a night of adventure - 11 adventures to be precise. She drags him out in the middle of the night to assist her with getting some revenge on her ex-boyfriend and other ex-friends. This part was light and enjoyable.
Part two involves the disappearance of Margo, and the narrator's search for her, which takes him, mostly, into the afore-mentioned analysis of Song of Myself. This part worked decently, especially at the start, where it took the shape of an actual mystery. Eventually, the mystery became nothing but an exercise in self-pity, and I didn't like it so much. I did like the developments with the two "side-kicks": Ben and Radar. And the climax, during prom night was good (but a bit more subdued than Carrie, for example)
Part Three is an extended road trip that takes place instead of graduation. Put six kids into a minivan for twenty hours and what do you get? A whole lot of nothing here. In Fault, I thought the characters had way too much interesting to say to each other. Green goes to the opposite extreme here. Twenty hours together, and the most interesting thing any of them have to say is "I have to pee." It was good for a few laughs, but ultimately I thought this third part was both diverting and pointless.
All this was followed by a fairly touching coda, which redeemed some of the failings I saw earlier. I did like this book, but now I'm pretty sure that I won't lightly be picking up another Green book soon.