An Abundance of Katherines, by John Green

John Green is a young adult fiction author whose books have been challenged in the past.  In honor of Banned Books Week, here’s the rundown on one of my favorites of his:

Most guys have a type.  Some guys like girls with red hair, girls with curves, maybe girls who play sports.  Colin Singleton has a totally different type: he likes girls named Katherine (Katherine with a “K,” to be specific).  After graduating high school and getting brutally dumped by his 19^th Katherine in a row, Colin is crushed, a washed up girlfriendless child prodigy with no summer plans. 

To cure his K-19 blues, Colin soon gets dragged on a road trip by his best friend, the hilarious and heavyset Judge Judy-adoring Hassan. 

The two of them soon find themselves in the middle of nowhere Gutshot Tennessee.  Colin’s new mission for the summer: binge on fast food, stop moping, prove his mathematically theory of dating, hunt for wild hogs without dying, and breaking his Katherine strak by pursuing his crush on the very cute but very unavailable Lindsey.

Summer?  Just got a whole lot more interesting.

Though the writing is the focal point of Katherines, John Green has included lots of fun extras throughout the book that enhance the story, like Colin’s attempts to determine the success rate of relationships using mathematical equations.

Colin is a funny and fully realized character in his own right, and Green captures his voice to a T, spinning a truly thoughtful and entertaining tale of a road trip and love gone awry.  Highly recommended (as are all of Green’s books, for that matter!)