John Green is a young adult author who has written several novels. I read about him in a library magazine and ordered a couple of them. An Abundance of Katherines is about Colin, a child prodigy who has just finished high school and has a bright future ahead of him at college, and his friend Hassan, who, while intelligent, has no plans to go to college and is content to stay home and watch t.v. all day. Although he knows several languages and reads several hundred pages a day (remembering everything that he reads), Colin is not gifted in the girlfriend area. All of his girlfriends have been named Katherine, and all of them have dumped him. In order to get over his broken heart and have him ready to begin college in the fall, Colin's parents allow him and Hassan to take a road trip. They leave their urban Chicago home and end up in Gutshot, Tennessee--and so the adventure begins.
What ensues is Colin eventually finding himself and figuring out his Katherine theorem (yes, he his graphing his relationships), but he and Hassan manage to have some great adventures in the meantime. What I liked best about this story is the humor. I have been accused of having a dry wit myself, and this book is full of it. Putting two Chicago boys, one Jew and one Arab, into the deep South is funny in and of itself, without the addition of a pretty girl, her redneck boyfriend, a factory that only makes tampon strings, and a hog hunt. I'm not sure if the kids that I serve in my library will like this book as much as I did, but I thought that it was great, and I will recommend it to them.
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