Book of the Week #9: Paper Towns

This week, I rounded out my John Green collection. After finishing Paper Towns, I have read all the books that he wrote, with the exception of Will Grayson, Will Grayson, which he only wrote half of.

Paper Towns isn’t my favorite of his. It’s not poorly written, it’s just not my cup of tea.
It’s about a troubled girl named Margo, narrated by her friend Q. Margo is essentially destructive, cruising through town defacing property in the name of harming those who have wronged her in some way. Their pranks are actually quite ingenious, in a truly childish way. She falls into that teenage trap of thinking that she is misunderstood, and everything is “fake”. In fact, the phrase “paper towns” comes from the idea of fake towns being put on maps for copyright reasons. It seems to me that Margo just needs some attention, and that Q is willing to give that to her. Still, Margo later runs away, and Q (with some help) follows clues to find her.

I don’t really have much to say about this. It was well-written, detailed, and a pretty good read. But I didn’t enjoy it. I didn’t feel the connection. I didn’t feel the love. It was simply a book. It followed in John Green’s theme of loss and coping, although in this novel, Margo’s coping skills are wildly unhelpful. I kept waiting for things to get better, and for me to be grabbed, but it never happened. At the end, the characters simply vanished. I’d give it a 5/10. Like I said, it’s well written, but it’s not magnificent.