“Because you're only thinking they-might-not-like-me-they-might-not-like-me, and guess what? When you act like that, no one likes you.”
An Abundance of Katherines
written by John Green
When asked to describe me, my brother (whose birthday is today) answered simply, “Alien”, and it stuck. As we got older, making up grand stories about the origins of “Amber the Alien”, I began to see a grain of truth in my brother’s wild statement about me. While I am obviously a human being, there are things about myself that are different from other people, primarily, the fact that I am fascinated with practically everything. I love to learn, and one of the things I had to learn was that not everyone thinks that things, like the discovery and significance of the marine chronometer, are worth learning.
Colin Singleton, a fellow "alien" in An Abundance of Katherines has this lesson to learn too because he would be interested in learning the marine chronometer. He is interested in many things and focuses on learning everything he can; he is a prodigy and a wannabe genius. I am not a prodigy. While Colin can speak and read multiple languages, I am comfortable with just the one. While mastering many different subjects, Colin's social skills are lacking. This is due to his inability to sort out what is interesting to others and what is interesting only to himself. This alienated him from others for a long time. Luckily he was able to befriend Hassan, whose strait forward humor helps him to learn how to make the distinction and who also proves to be a loyal friend after Colin is dumped for the nineteenth time by Katherine.
Colin has previously defined himself with two things; 1) he is a prodigy and 2) he only dates girls named Katherine. Thus far he has dated nineteen girls, all named Katherine, and it was his brutal break up with Katherine XIX after his graduation ceremony that leaves Colin obsessed with proving his potential genius by discovering a theorem that graphs and predicts when two people will break up and the dumper and dumpee. Hassan decides enough is enough and forces the grieving Colin to get off the floor and join him on a therapeutic road trip.
It is on this road trip that Colin must decide wether to continue to live in his labels ("only a prodigy" and "only dates Katherines") or to break through them and discover "the great perhaps".
If you have read John Greens books you know that I just borrowed that phrase "the great perhaps" from Green's other book, Looking for Alaska. But in this phrase holds what is special about Green's books. In all of his books I have read (Looking for Alaska, An Abundance of Katherines, and The Fault in Our Stars) I have found that they are all different in the way they are told yet similar in the theme they present which is; reaching adulthood and seeing your life stretching out in front of you and deciding who you will be yet not knowing who you will become. In other words a "great perhaps". It's a tricky theme and feeling to pen down, but Green has succeeded in conveying this feeling that we have all felt one time or another. A feeling that I am currently experiencing. A feeling that Colin now finds himself face to face with.
Heartache will do strange things to a person and Colin is no exception. Even when he and Hassan end up in the humble little town of Gutshot, Tennessee and end up meeting Lindsey, a girl whose small town exterior hides her potential and "alien" ideas. Colin and Hassan end up staying a while and end up having a memorable time. But all the while Colin struggles with letting go of his past and self-made definitions of himself and embracing his present and all that he is.
This book presents a simpler story than what you might expect, but John Green's distinct voice and resounding theme make this small town adventure a worthy read. Mostly because wether you are an "alien" or not, we all must figure out the difference between defining yourself and being yourself. No one can be described in one word or even one hundred words, and we should stop trying to and just be.
Dedicated to Alex, Happy Birthday