Fangirl

Oh, Rainbow Rowell...you did it again.

This is the third time I've stolen away during work breaks, cut my workout short, and ignored my bedtime (5 AM comes oh so early...) to finish one of your books.  Where I can't wait to get back to your characters, and can't seem to get out from that blurred reality/fiction line and think I'm actually friends with them.  Which I guess goes really well with this new book!

Fangirl, the new YA novel by Rainbow Rowell, takes a look at fanfiction culture- and being a college freshman.  Socially awkward Cath writes fanfiction about Simon Snow (a Harry Potter-like character), and has made a name for herself in that world.  However, college throws a wrench into her introverted life- her roommate is mean, her twin sister won't talk to her, her Dad is manic, and there's a boy that won't leave her alone.  She just wants to stay in and write, but things keep forcing her to leave her comfort zone.  Will Cath learn to live in the real world? Or will she stay in her stories?

If you couldn't tell from my first paragraph, I loved this book.  It may be my Introverted, INFJ-ishness, but I related SO much to Cath!  Or as I wrote in my notebook "I have Cath-like tendencies!"  

The novel threw me back to my college days- dorm living, pushy professors (those are always the best ones, though, right?)  It also reminded me of how I preferred to stay in reading & watching movies until someone would pull me out into a social setting.

Rowell writes such real characters- smart, funny, flawed, awkward.  A board member and I even discussed last night after our meeting how real Eleanor & Park was.  She had said she didn't like the ending, but she loved the book- "Everything was just very...real," she said.  I agreed, and that is one of the Rainbow Rowell novels I devoured in a single day.  I genuinely liked the key players in Fangirl, and the few I didn't like were for good reason (they were well-written a-holes!)

And so, I will just leave this at: if you are an introvert, socially awkward, reader/writer of fanfiction (or a reader/writer in general), have dysfunction in your family, and love little "aw" moments- read this.  I can't say enough good things about it.





Fangirl is published by Macmillan.  ARC received from publisher at ALA 2013.
Release Date: 09.10.2013