The lovely book Paper Towns by John Green tells the story about a teenage boy named Quentin Jacobsen, aka Q, and his relationship with the mysterious girl named Margo Roth Spiegelman. Q has always had a crush on his neighbor Margo and they used to be friends, but time drove them apart. Until one night when Margo climbs through Q's window, bringing him along on a night of revenge. The following morning Margo has disappeared. Her unconcerned parents tell the police she will return as previous times. Q however is not convinced. Margo has left him breadcrumbs to follow, and as he tries to unravel the mystery he reveals loads of things, not just about Margo but about himself and his companions Ben, Radar and Lacey as well. After Margo being gone for almost a month Q finds a place he is certain she's at, so he brings his friends on a 21 hour road trip to Agloe, New York. Once there they find Margo, although she is not the Margo Roth Spiegelman they all thought she was.
Character:
Quentin Jacobsen, aka Q, is the story’s protagonist. He lives with his parents in Jefferson Park, Orlando, Florida, next door to Margo Roth Spiegelman. Ever since they were small Quentin has been in love with Margo. They both go to Jefferson High, so does Q’s best friends Ben and Radar.
To me Q is a very average teenage boy who has his questions about everything possible to question. He is not the popular jock, or the computer nerd, or the geeky band member. He is just a boy who unquestionably likes Margo Roth Spiegelman and who really wants to get to know her. The real Margo. He isn’t the bravest and does not want to commit crimes. For instance; Margo wants to break into SeaWorld with him, and Radar needs him to drive the car at 72 mph, and he is extremely hesitant to do both things. However, Margo changes him and he even dares to send a threatening email in the meantime of her disappearance. I also received the impression that Q never upsets his parents; he is never late to school, never parties, and goes to bed at a decent time. It is not until after Margo that he is late, parties, and goes to bed at five in the morning. Ultimately, Margo changed Q considerably.
Conflict:
What drives the story to continue is of course Margo Roth Spiegelman. When she disappears and leaves Q all these clues for him to follow he decides to find her, which naturally becomes the challenge for the main character. However, there are many other factors that also place in. Q’s friends make up a lot of the story, if it hadn’t been for them the book would just be about a boy looking for a girl. Now the story is full of these characters who are pulled into a world without Margo Roth Spiegelman, and if it weren’t for the stupidity of Ben, the smartness of Radar, and the innocence of Lacey, Q would never had discovered the different persons that was Margo Roth Spiegelman, neither would he had found out as much about himself that he did.
Setting:
Paper Town is the name of the book and this is explained in three various ways throughout the book. You first encounter it on page 57 when Margo brings Q to the SunTrust Building to take in the whole beauty that is the suburb of Orlando, Florida. In the SunTrust Building Margo calls Orlando a paper town as a metaphor for the fake people living there. A paper town, as finally explained in the book, is a fake town created (by cartographers) and ”inserted into tourist maps as a copyright trap”.
As mentioned, the story is set in Orlando, in a fictional subdivision called Jefferson Park where Q and Margo live next door. Later on the reader is introduced to a mini-mall in a pseudo-division (an abandoned subdivision) where Margo seems to have spent some time. This place is very dark and frightening with no windows, a broken ceiling, it’s also dirty and littered (at first I received the impression they would find Margo dead there), but after Q spends a night there he accustoms himself with the place, and the rats, along with a new perspective of Margo.
During the 21 hour long road trip Q’s minivan turns into a figurative house; the passenger side is the den, the driver’s seat the living room, the center console the kitchen, the first bench seat is the first bedroom and the second bench seat the second bedroom. The idea of the car being a small house appealed to me and I enjoyed reading about the time the characters spent in there. At the same time the car was destined to be an extremely temporary home and I understood that something had to happen to it, hence the, nearly, car crash with a cow.
Style:
The language used throughout the novel is both informal and a little complex, because there is a lot of interpretation needed. However, it is not too complex since it is a young adult book. In the dialogues the language is very informal, with a lot of ‘like’’s and ‘you know’’s.
What’s more, the book sometimes changes verb tenses. John Green explained in his blog why he has mixed tenses in the book: when people talk they often change the tenses because they start off by telling something they usually did and when reaching the shocking part of the story they change to present tense as if they can still feel it happening. In my opinion it’s perfect for that kind of book, although I was bothered by it somewhat. Otherwise the style of the language was very descriptive in terms of setting and plot, and although the book talks about two-dimensional people the characters were far from flat.
Finally, I can definitely say that this book has changed me in a positive way and I couldn’t be more glad that I read it. I believe it was somewhere in the middle of the book where I started to truly grasp what the book was about. In my opinion, it’s about how we fail to see people for who they really are, no matter if it’s a perfect person or a bad one, because we can never become another human being. I was caught by what Ben said in the book:
”Like, I always thought Lacey was so hot and so awesome and so cool, but now when it actually comes to being with her... it’s not the exact same.”
This is what Q does as well; he sees Margo as this perfect person when in fact she is just a girl. That is the message of the book. We idealise the people we like without thinking of them as the human beings they are, and we need to be aware of this to stop thinking the other person should be more like us. Instead we should try to understand the other person as much as possible, despite not being able to become them.
This is what Q does as well; he sees Margo as this perfect person when in fact she is just a girl. That is the message of the book. We idealise the people we like without thinking of them as the human beings they are, and we need to be aware of this to stop thinking the other person should be more like us. Instead we should try to understand the other person as much as possible, despite not being able to become them.
And also: the Paper Towns movie will premiere July 24 2015!!
