Popsugar Ultimate Reading Challenge:
I'll admit that I got sucked into the trend that was The Fault In Our Stars. I really did like the book and I thought the movie adaptation was pretty good. Since I loved that book, I was sure to love the rest of Green's work...yeah no. Earlier this year I read Paper Towns, which was just eh. I wasn't impressed. Clearly I didn't learn from that because I decided to read Green's first YA novel Looking for Alaska, which checks off 3 of my Popsugar qualifications!
Before. Miles "Pudge" Halter's whole existence has been one big nonevent, and his obsession with famous last words has only made him crave the "Great Perhaps" (François Rabelais, poet) even more. He heads off to the sometimes crazy, possibly unstable, and anything-but-boring world of Culver Creek Boarding School, and his life becomes the opposite of safe. Because down the hall is Alaska Young. The gorgeous, clever, funny, sexy, self-destructive, screwed-up, and utterly fascinating Alaska Young, who is an event unto herself. She pulls Pudge into her world, launches him into the Great Perhaps, and steals his heart.
After. Nothing is ever the same.
I had extremely high hopes for this book. I've read books about kids at boarding school before and they're usually quite scandalous, this was not the case. Pudge (our skinny protagonist/narrator) did nothing that I didn't do in high school, so I didn't find him endearing or adventurous. As for our title character Alaska Young she was alright. I don't really have a clear picture of her in my head, which means her description was short and non-memorable. The only character I really liked was Chip or "the Colonel" as he prefers to be called and also Pudge's roommate. Any other character mentioned is not worth writing about.
I did think that the structure of Before & After an incident within the story was interesting. I was dying to know what said incident was only to find out that it was the death of our title character. *Sigh* Lame! Then again why wouldn't it because that is the structure of a John Green novel. Lonely outcast pines for regulation hottie, then poof she be gone and band of misfits must find said girl. And the girl is also always built up to be some type of mythical unicorn type creature, when in all actuality she's kind of bitchy and nothing special, yes Alaska was that girl. It was the same structure of Paper Towns except Margo didn't care to be found and well she was still alive.
Looking for Alaska is considered a banned book and I can't tell you why. they don't really swear much, all have better GPA's then I did in high school, but they do drink heavily in 2 scenes, which is the reason Alaska was in an accident. For me this book just didn't do it. I love YA and I read a lot of YA, but I've learned that John Green isn't for me. If you've read his other books and loved them then you will love Looking for Alaska, but if you've only read The Fault in Our Stars I'd skip this. The second bit of that magical dish always isn't as good as the first. Its been real John Green, but I'm afraid out time together is over. That's all for now!
P.S. Just to throw this in there as a quality I liked about this book is searching for the meaning of death or what happens to us when we die. That's a question every person has whether they're 16 years old or 56 years old. Pudge and the band of misfits go on searching for what really happened to Alaska, they don't like the answer they found, but it was important for closure. They quickly go through the 7 stages of grief, rather realistically, so this book wasn't a total waste.
- A Popular Author's First Book
- A Book Set in High School
- A Banned Book
I'll admit that I got sucked into the trend that was The Fault In Our Stars. I really did like the book and I thought the movie adaptation was pretty good. Since I loved that book, I was sure to love the rest of Green's work...yeah no. Earlier this year I read Paper Towns, which was just eh. I wasn't impressed. Clearly I didn't learn from that because I decided to read Green's first YA novel Looking for Alaska, which checks off 3 of my Popsugar qualifications!
Before. Miles "Pudge" Halter's whole existence has been one big nonevent, and his obsession with famous last words has only made him crave the "Great Perhaps" (François Rabelais, poet) even more. He heads off to the sometimes crazy, possibly unstable, and anything-but-boring world of Culver Creek Boarding School, and his life becomes the opposite of safe. Because down the hall is Alaska Young. The gorgeous, clever, funny, sexy, self-destructive, screwed-up, and utterly fascinating Alaska Young, who is an event unto herself. She pulls Pudge into her world, launches him into the Great Perhaps, and steals his heart.
After. Nothing is ever the same.
I had extremely high hopes for this book. I've read books about kids at boarding school before and they're usually quite scandalous, this was not the case. Pudge (our skinny protagonist/narrator) did nothing that I didn't do in high school, so I didn't find him endearing or adventurous. As for our title character Alaska Young she was alright. I don't really have a clear picture of her in my head, which means her description was short and non-memorable. The only character I really liked was Chip or "the Colonel" as he prefers to be called and also Pudge's roommate. Any other character mentioned is not worth writing about.
I did think that the structure of Before & After an incident within the story was interesting. I was dying to know what said incident was only to find out that it was the death of our title character. *Sigh* Lame! Then again why wouldn't it because that is the structure of a John Green novel. Lonely outcast pines for regulation hottie, then poof she be gone and band of misfits must find said girl. And the girl is also always built up to be some type of mythical unicorn type creature, when in all actuality she's kind of bitchy and nothing special, yes Alaska was that girl. It was the same structure of Paper Towns except Margo didn't care to be found and well she was still alive.
Looking for Alaska is considered a banned book and I can't tell you why. they don't really swear much, all have better GPA's then I did in high school, but they do drink heavily in 2 scenes, which is the reason Alaska was in an accident. For me this book just didn't do it. I love YA and I read a lot of YA, but I've learned that John Green isn't for me. If you've read his other books and loved them then you will love Looking for Alaska, but if you've only read The Fault in Our Stars I'd skip this. The second bit of that magical dish always isn't as good as the first. Its been real John Green, but I'm afraid out time together is over. That's all for now!
P.S. Just to throw this in there as a quality I liked about this book is searching for the meaning of death or what happens to us when we die. That's a question every person has whether they're 16 years old or 56 years old. Pudge and the band of misfits go on searching for what really happened to Alaska, they don't like the answer they found, but it was important for closure. They quickly go through the 7 stages of grief, rather realistically, so this book wasn't a total waste.
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