Paper Towns – John Green

Information about the Book

Genre: YA Realistic Fiction
Print Length: 305 pages
Publisher: Dutton Books
Publication Date: 10/16/2008
Reading Age (my opinion): over 15

4.5/5

I’m going to say this as many times as it takes for people – readers, listeners, bloggers, the normal people – to realize this: John Green will never, ever stop pleasing me with his understanding of philosophy and knowledge. He embraces quirkiness and nerddom, if that makes sense (which it might not, but idk). Paper Towns felt like a book that gave a message that teenage years and teens in general, are always going to be dedicated or passionate to or for something. For Quentin, I guess his passion was Margo Roth Spiegelman.

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The characters in this book felt really… real. Despite only being a teenager for a few weeks so far, I’ve realized that a lot of the characters had the most amazing and flawed characteristics and idiosyncrasies that I just completely loved, and respected. Actually, I think respect might go too far for this book (some content in this book was somewhat, um, explicit and therefore deemed unworthy of respect for my likes), but I just found that these little quirks and peculiarities of each character were too interestingly preeminent for this book. 

I honestly thought this book was blatantly realistic, and I felt like I was observing real teenager behavior. These characters weren’t like the written, literaturistic (yet another MADE UP word i think…) caricatures of people that I read in many books. These books aren’t necessarily John Green books, but a multitude of others that I would prefer not to say because I have this not-logical fear of getting blackballed and harassed by some of my favorite authors.

Anyways, enough about the characters. Time to let loose for the things that I love in this:

  1. I laughed out loud so many times, my family looked at each other like I was having a nervous breakdown. Also the content is absolutely, breathtakingly hilarious when pieced altogether and I think that was one way that John Green managed to put himself into my favorite authors list.
  2. I probably underlined so many quotes that my pencil ran out of lead and the pages were about half pencil marks and annotations at that point. But I really couldn’t decide which ones were the best to include in this review (so here’s one of the many favorites): It is easy to forget how full the world is of people, full to bursting, and each of them imagined and consistently misimagined.
  3. The depth. Oh my god, the depth of the book was, like, overwhelming. I had to put a fan in my room to scare it away (just kidding no one does that ~laughs nervously~). It was despite all of the comedy relief that I experienced from this book, there was a deeper meaning that came from every one of Margo’s experiences. 
  4. This book was very good for teenagers to relate to. Some YA stuff I read is like ‘hey! i have this fantabulous idea where these teenagers are constantly faced with a demise that might kill them every single time they come near. also the kids have problems, their parents are dead, and society is lying and secretly hates them all. oh and dont forget to make a movie/tv series where the characters are played by forty year old men and 36 year old women because thats just flix for you!’
    No. I just loved it because it was realistic. Though I’m kinda mad that the cast ages were KIND of off point, the book was good. Pretty close to actual teenagers.
  5.  John Green does his job not adequately, but over-the-top. He, if you would devote him time to, would show you each small aspect of the book universe in the most amazing way, and would take you on a journey to let the characters connect with the reader in a pleasantly unexpected way. There’s dramatic attraction and also reflection on the world in a deeper, more philosophical way, and that’s what differentiates John Green from other authors; he isn’t just an author, but a true writer.

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Anyways, this book is a must read. Will I go back to reading fiction and dystopian and god knows what other genre? Yeah, it’s fairly obvious. But if I had to read one book about the philosophy of Paper Towns, I’d choose your book, JG.

Thanks for reading and hope u all have a wonderful rest of the day! Byeee <33

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