Review of Paper Towns by John Green

“When did we see each other face-to-face? Not until you saw into my cracks and I saw into yours. Before that, we were just looking at ideas of each other, like looking at your window shade but never seeing inside. But once the vessel cracks, the light can get in. The light can get out.”

John Green, Paper Towns


I had SO MUCH trouble picking the quote for this book. There are so many beautiful parts! So many moments of clarity and brilliance, and I just, AG. I'll quit fangirling in a moment, I swear*.




John Green has taken this genre by storm in ways I cannot begin to put into words. I first read An Abundance of Katherines without knowing that he, alongside his brother, are popular youtube vloggers and educators, responsible for the yearly youtube event Project for Awesome, which raises money for various charities.

Paper Towns is told from the perspective of Quentin Jacobsen, nicknamed Q. His next door neighbor (and object of affection) is Margo Roth Spiegelman. Q has loved her for most of their lives, although he doesn't really know the enigma she has become.

The book is divided into three parts:

The Strings, in which many things occur during a midnight adventure and we see Q and Margo as she enacts her revenge on her so-called friends. Also, they break into Sea World?

The Grass, where Q learns that Margo has disappeared. His attempts at discovering where she is lead to him discovering more about Margo than he though possible. This section includes Woodie Guthrie (This machine kills fascists), Walt Whitman (I tramp a perpetual journey), and an explanation of paper towns (fake towns that cartographers used to help protect themselves from copyright infringement.)


The Vessel, which is easily the funniest and at times the most heartbreaking part of the book. It involves a road trip, best friends, and discoveries.

Yes, this is author John Green dressed up as Walt Whitman.
No, I do not have any context for this picture. 

One of the biggest themes of this book involves something John Green had touched on with his earlier book, Looking for Alaska, and that is the concept of imagining people complexly. It seems like a simple enough concept, but it is something that we as a society forget to do all the time. With Margo, Q sees only what she presents of herself. She can try to control the opinion that others have by her, but in the end, no one looks past her crazy stunts to discover why she is the way she is. Imagining someone complexly means imagining all the complicated things that make up a person like dreams and emotions and motivations. When you forget that, you forget that this person has individual dreams and emotions and motivations and instead you see them as what you are imagining they are. It means knowing that you don't know everything there is to know about a person and that you can't define someone because it suits your needs. (Or, as my friend Eli would say, "You don't know my life!")

Another major theme is, common in a coming of age story but handled brilliantly is that of growing up. All the characters are in their senior year of high school and graduate by the end of the book. I remember rereading certain passages the night before graduation and having that feeling resonate so much. That isn't to say you won't identify with it if you aren't a senior - change and growth and the feeling of losing something to make room for new things is one that everyone will experience over and over.

There is so much more that I am unable to touch on - how hysterical this book is, how the characters are so well fleshed out (Seriously, Ben Starling why aren't you real let's get married?), the wonderful connections to masterpieces of literature, how beautifully constructed the plot is, how though provoking, I could seriously go on for ever.

Bottom line, when people try and ridicule this genre, I want to throw this book at their heads. Because, seriously? This is the epitome of quality.





P.S. Also, check out this wonderful Ted Talks video by the author. Related to the book in that it discusses the phenomena of paper towns, but it examines the idea of learning outside of the classroom.

*I lied.