okay so i was originally going to write a TMI post about how i hate being twenty-five because before this birthday i had a streak going of not throwing up for like seven years - i was still a teenager in high school. and then suddenly i turn twenty-five and on the same day i start this weird ritual of spending at least one night a month on the bathroom floor. and let me tell you, now i know why i gave up throwing up. it is not fun.
but then i started rereading the fault in our stars, and, well, book talk trumps everything. (though you may have noticed that i did manage to get in some TMI grossness up there.) anyway, reading TFIOS a second time is so much worse than reading it the first time, let me tell you. i know why i kept subconsciously putting it off. i mean, when you start it the first time you realize it's a cancer story and you kinda expect some sort of a sad ending, but there is that hope present in the initial reading, that whisper that maybe it'll all be okay. then all of the plot twists hit you hard in the gut and you find yourself with a steady stream of tears running down your cheeks as you turn the pages and you are left with a heavy sense of this-is-sad-this-is-wrong for days afterwards. when you read it the second time, there is just this feeling of doom hanging over everything the entire time. knowing the outcome is infinitely worse than not knowing. at least with this book.
but. rereading the book brought to mind certain things that kill me about it. and not in the good way. first of all, and this might just be me being anal, but john green has this habit of referring to 2005ish as the mid-2000s. (i'm pretty sure he does this in a couple of his books, but it could just be this one.) and that just annoys me so much. because the mid-2000s means around 2500. that's just the way it works. you can't change that. 2005 is still way early in the baby years of 2000. no where near middle age yet.
there is also this line that makes me want to go to every john green fan and punch them in the face (and then applaud their taste in books). hazel says that she falls in love with augustus the way you fall asleep: "slowly then all at once." and the john green fandom loves to use that quote to show his pure literary genius. but no. because he did not think that up entirely by himself. see, i have this relationship with prozac nation in which i have read it countless times and pretty much have it memorized but never recommend it to friends because it's just too personal. there is this one point in the book where she says that going mad happens slowly then all at once just like how hemingway described bankruptcy in the sun also rises. you see what she did there? she said where she got the reference from. now, i'm sure there are a lot of books that use that phrase, and i don't really mind it, but the people attributing it to green need to stop because hemingway said it first. if you are going to call the coiner of the phrase genius, you should know who freakin' coined the phrase. /rant.
oh, and john green writes these really metaphorically obsessed pretentious teenagers that are all about metaphysical i spy and the symbolic-ness of everything, and most of the time i love them, but sometimes i am feeling surly and just want to tell him no. stop that.
anyway, i'm at the point in the book where everything seems so perfect and everything is going right and past!me thought that there will probably be a happy ending at this point (and then stupidly thought something about him not having the nerve to be realistic) and i just know that there will be tears soon and gut-wrenching sadness. *sigh*
*The Sun - Maroon 5
but then i started rereading the fault in our stars, and, well, book talk trumps everything. (though you may have noticed that i did manage to get in some TMI grossness up there.) anyway, reading TFIOS a second time is so much worse than reading it the first time, let me tell you. i know why i kept subconsciously putting it off. i mean, when you start it the first time you realize it's a cancer story and you kinda expect some sort of a sad ending, but there is that hope present in the initial reading, that whisper that maybe it'll all be okay. then all of the plot twists hit you hard in the gut and you find yourself with a steady stream of tears running down your cheeks as you turn the pages and you are left with a heavy sense of this-is-sad-this-is-wrong for days afterwards. when you read it the second time, there is just this feeling of doom hanging over everything the entire time. knowing the outcome is infinitely worse than not knowing. at least with this book.
but. rereading the book brought to mind certain things that kill me about it. and not in the good way. first of all, and this might just be me being anal, but john green has this habit of referring to 2005ish as the mid-2000s. (i'm pretty sure he does this in a couple of his books, but it could just be this one.) and that just annoys me so much. because the mid-2000s means around 2500. that's just the way it works. you can't change that. 2005 is still way early in the baby years of 2000. no where near middle age yet.
there is also this line that makes me want to go to every john green fan and punch them in the face (and then applaud their taste in books). hazel says that she falls in love with augustus the way you fall asleep: "slowly then all at once." and the john green fandom loves to use that quote to show his pure literary genius. but no. because he did not think that up entirely by himself. see, i have this relationship with prozac nation in which i have read it countless times and pretty much have it memorized but never recommend it to friends because it's just too personal. there is this one point in the book where she says that going mad happens slowly then all at once just like how hemingway described bankruptcy in the sun also rises. you see what she did there? she said where she got the reference from. now, i'm sure there are a lot of books that use that phrase, and i don't really mind it, but the people attributing it to green need to stop because hemingway said it first. if you are going to call the coiner of the phrase genius, you should know who freakin' coined the phrase. /rant.
oh, and john green writes these really metaphorically obsessed pretentious teenagers that are all about metaphysical i spy and the symbolic-ness of everything, and most of the time i love them, but sometimes i am feeling surly and just want to tell him no. stop that.
anyway, i'm at the point in the book where everything seems so perfect and everything is going right and past!me thought that there will probably be a happy ending at this point (and then stupidly thought something about him not having the nerve to be realistic) and i just know that there will be tears soon and gut-wrenching sadness. *sigh*
*The Sun - Maroon 5
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