Book Cover
Book Summary
Child prodigy Colin Singleton has been dumped by the 19th Katherine in a row. In an attempt to pull him out of his post-dumping funk, his best friend convinces him that a road trip is the best possible medicine. They end up in a tiny town in middle Tennessee working for the owner of the local factory collecting stories from the people in town. During the summer, Colin makes a new friend, develops a grand formula of relationships, and learns a lot about himself, his friends, and life in general.
APA Reference of Book
Green, J. (2006). An abundance of Katherines. New York, NY: Dutton Books.
Impressions
I have long avoided John Green books because they always make everyone I know cry. This book had caught my attention several years ago, before I knew who John Green was, but I never got around to reading it. I enjoyed this book more than I thought I would. It is not a typical John Green book. No one has a terminal illness and no one dies. The journey Colin goes on (mentally, not so much physically) is something to which most teenagers can relate. That floundering that happens when you are afraid you will never be able to be what you have always wanted as well as the sense of loss and emptiness after a breakup are pretty universal. The book ends on a very hopeful note, but a very realistic one as well.
Professional Review
"Former child prodigy Colin, faced with the real-world uselessness of his genius for trivia and word games, has no idea what to do with his life. Floundering, he lets his best friend Hassan drag him on a road trip while he attempts to recover from his breakup with Katherine XIX (he only dates girls named Katherine). Visiting the grave of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Tennessee, they befriend the tour guide, Lindsey Lee Wells, and accept summer jobs from her mother. As the three teens grow closer, Colin deals with his Katherine baggage by attempting tocrack the code of love with his “Theorem of Underlying Katherine Predictability” (his last chance, he thinks, to “do something that matters”). Flashbacks to the various Katherine romances flesh out Colin’s character (a pitch-perfect blend of self-doubt and oblivious narcissism) and provide hilarious insight into the peculiarities and universalities of insecure love. Hassan, often the butt of his own Muslim jokes, subverts the “jolly fat guy” stereotype with a quick wit and mounting frustration with being the sidekick. The final confrontation between Colin and him is the heart of the story, far more affecting than Colin’s romantic tribulations. Laugh-out-loud funny, this second novel by the author of Printz winner Looking for Alaska (rev. 3/05) charts a singular coming-of-age American road trip that is at once a satire of and tribute to its many celebrated predecessors."
Gross, C. E. (2006). [Review of An abundance of Katherines by John Green]. Horn Book Magazine, 82(5), 583-584. Retrieved from: http://www.hbook.com/
Library Uses
This book would make a good addition to any discussion of romantic relationships and friendships.
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