Will Grayson, Will Grayson

[jade_sabre]

Aside from the fact where the very end of it contained a popular fiction occurrence that has an inversely proportional occurrence rate in reality (i.e., all the time to almost never),

I laughed

I sniffled

it moved me, Bob.

p.s. I like John Green's writing better than David Leviathan's, but the two styles really balanced well together.

ALSO APPARENTLY WE HAVE CORAMBIS JUST SITTING AROUND MY HOUSE, WHAT, WHY DID I NOT KNOW THIS, /READS IMMEDIATELY.

Comments

[nessismore.livejournal.com]

This makes me want to reeeeeeeeeeead. I haven't read (anything fiction) since before graduation.

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

do it do it do it

[fathomlesssky.livejournal.com]

I should get to reading Corambis, actually, even though that series tends to bum me out a lot. Unlike John Green books. And I think David Leviathan tends to work better for me in collaborations because I also really enjoyed Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist which he cowrote but don't feel very strongly about any of his solo works.

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

oh yeah. I think The Virtu was the bummingest of them all--Mirador was rough, but it was such an engaging, tightly-plotted book that my thorough enjoyment of it balanced out how crappy everyone's lives were becoming.

[farens.livejournal.com]

I read it a few days after it came out because I <3 John Green anything and I LOVED IT. I cried and got all anxious which is what happens when I care too much about the characters. I loved both Will Graysons and still don't know which one I like more. It was really an excellent book, and was well done. I agree about not liking David Levithan's style as much as John Green's, but thy did work well, all things considered. I'm glad you liked it!

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

ALTHOUGH FARENS I had an epiphany today which is that John Green needs to write more nerd girls, i.e. he needs to write more than one nerd girl per book in which that one nerd girl is also the MC's eventual girlfriend, because a) nerd girls are awesome b) nerd girls deserve friends who are also nerd girls c) Jane kind of disappeared, or at least stopped having fun cool nerdy lines, after she and Will got their act together. COME ON JOHN GREEN, YOU SHOULD KNOW BETTER THAN THAT.

[farens.livejournal.com]

I KNOW, RIGHT? That part did rather annoy me, how Jane turned into just...girlfriend instead of awesome nerdy girl after she and Will got together. I agree! But then again, John Green PWNS at writing nerd girls--perhaps he will slip more than one into his next book...that has something to do with a desert island, apparently...

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

IT IS A SLIP, I WILL FORGIVE HIM, BUT WE MUST BE VIGILANT. He's good at writing nerd girls, but I wish there was someone out there who wrote nerd girls the way he writes nerd boys--like, the characters in An Abundance of Katherines were so exactly like the nerd boys I knew in high school, down to the thought processes, and I wish someone could capture nerd girls from the same POV.

/can't write real-world YA fiction to save her life

[farens.livejournal.com]

Have you ever read Looking for Alaska? I found I liked that one more than An Abundance of Katherines--although that one was still wonderfully done and enjoyable. I guess John Green finds it more comfortable to write nerd boys who fall in love with nerd girls? Perhaps that's why he persists in nerd boy POV.

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

Really? 'cause I definitely felt the other way around. And I liked how he resolved the issues in Paper Towns (esp. those issues that had also popped up in LFA and AAOK), but I still liked the guys in AAOK better. I did love the part where LFA was set in Alabama and I knew exactly where all the places he mentioned were.

Oh, I don't mind that he writes from nerd boy POVs--I love it to pieces--he can go right on doing that--he just needs more nerd girl characters so the nerd girls can have nerd girl friends. And then someone else with a talent for writing nerd girls in as realistic a way as JG writes nerd boys needs to start writing books. :D

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

a popular fiction occurrence that has an inversely proportional occurrence rate in reality

Which was? I think I know what you're referring to, but I want to be sure.

p.s. I like John Green's writing better than David Leviathan's, but the two styles really balanced well together.

Same here. It took me a few chapters to get into it, but I wound up really liking the mix of the two styles.

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

SPOILER





and then we put on a play and the audience really got into it and was singing along with the chorus and getting wild on their feet and doing things that real audiences, no matter how much they love what they're seeing, don't actually do. Glee is the most recent (and worst) offender in this department, but it happens a lot. I'm pretty sure the only time it's okay is in Moulin Rouge, because that movie is all about being ridiculous.







END SPOILER




especially after you go from reading John Green's happy prose to Leviathan's angsty smallcaps...which, once we got to the part where it turned out the kid was clinically depressed (although can I say I would like to read about a main-character gay kid who doesn't have mental problems? also I am wondering how depression in teenagers work, and how much of it is imbalance, and that wanders off into a tangent about how many people in the U.S. are on anti-depressants and probably would be able to get off them if they would step back and look at their life; this is what I learned from working in a pharmacy) I was more forgiving.

[redbrunja.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the whole audience participation thing WAS very unrealistic.

how much of it is imbalance, and that wanders off into a tangent about how many people in the U.S. are on anti-depressants and probably would be able to get off them if they would step back and look at their life; this is what I learned from working in a pharmacy)

Less than people who think that assume, imho. I know a large number of people who are one anti-depressants, some of whom started in their teens, and if you need anti-depressants it is usually because there is a chemical imbalance in your brain, and somethings that isn't something that can be fixed or mediated by anything other than drugs.

[checkers65477.livejournal.com]

I need to read this! You may know that I LIKE John Green.

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

I think you will enjoy it. I read parts of it out loud to my dad, and he laughed very loudly, which I thought was a plus.

[philia-fan.livejournal.com]

Feir really liked this one, too. Just read a John Green so will probably wait, myself.

[beth-shulman.livejournal.com]

Hey! I was searching for reviews on Will Grayson, Will Grayson and found yours. Just curious, is it similar to John Green's other books? Because I love him, but he does tend to write similar characters. Like, An Abundance of Katherines felt a bit - old. Already done.

Also: greetings, fellow Sounisian :)

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

why hello there!

It is similar, although David Leviathan's sections (well, I haven't read any of his other books, so I can't promise his character isn't similar too) help break it up. I feel like every time John Green writes a book, he hits on something new and totally awesome (have you read Paper Towns? Because it took some of the quibbles I had with Looking for Alaska and AAoK and turned them on their head, and I was v. proud of him for doing it), but in exchange for that you're still dealing with similar characters--the best friend will always be more outrageous than the main character, etc. I also think he needs to start putting more girls in his novels, but that's just me.

so in answer to your question: yes, it is similar, but David Leviathan spikes the punch, so to speak; and John Green still has a hilarious turn of phrase that makes me giggle, so I'd say still worth reading. :-)

[beth-shulman.livejournal.com]

I loved Paper Towns, I did, though I still think that Looking for Alaska is his best book. (Can I ask what quibbles you had with it? Because I had quibbles with AAoK, and I'm not saying that I loved or related to most of Looking for Alaska's characters, but I was still super impressed with the book.)

And as long as he keeps writing girls like Margo, I won't complain about how many girls he has (though he could add a few). That scene where he realizes that Margo is just a girl? I got chills.

I haven't read any of DL's other books either, so I would be in this for John Green.

Thanks for answering!

[jade-sabre-301.livejournal.com]

Actually, the scene that gave you chills is the one that solved my quibbles--in the first two books, I enjoyed them, but I felt like the girls were all ending up on pedestals, and so having Margo knocked off hers appeased me greatly (especially when he had obviously put her on one in the first place). I like AAoK better than LfA, mostly for the footnotes, the running "no longer a child genius" thing, and the fact that Colin is exactly like my guy friends in high school were like, and I'd never encountered them in fiction before. LfA felt a little more "traditional" YA to me, while AAoK seemed newer--so I guess we had opposite reactions to it. :-)