Turtles All the Way Down

So I really wanted to like this book.  When I heard a new John Green book was coming out, I was excited.  I added it to my TBR list and finally got my copy from the library.  However, I was underwhelmed.  I did like parts of it, but overall it seemed a little scattered.

First the positives.  What I especially liked about it was his quirky characters, which he has in every one of his books.  An Abundance of Katherines features a guy who’s dated (and been dumped by) nineteen girls named Katherine and is now creating an algorithm to determine how long his next relationship will last.  Paper Towns takes us on the trail of Margo, a girl who vanishes into thin air after taking Quentin on a wild night of vandalism and breaking into Sea World.  Turtles All the Way Down also has a cast of characters with unique habits.  Aza is the main character who has crippling anxiety.  She’s our narrator, so we’re constantly going on sidetracks with her wandering thoughts (or “thought spirals,” as she calls them).  You can feel her nervousness and her mounting tension with herself very palpably.  Then there’s Daisy, her best friend, who kind of railroads Aza.  She’s loud, writes sexy Star Wars fan fiction featuring Rae and Chewbacca, and doesn’t really empathize with Aza at all.  Finally, there’s Aza’s old camp friend Davis, whose father is on the lam from the cops after a fraud investigation.  He’s quiet, brooding, and reflective (as seen by his personal yet philosophical random thoughts blog).  I really enjoy how Green creates these memorable characters and how open he is about his own anxiety disorder.  It really is a powerful statement to the fact that although a person may look normal, you never know what’s going on underneath it all.

My biggest concern lies in the story itself and the pacing.  How can a story go too slowly and too fast at the same time?  I don’t know, but this one succeeds at both.  At times it plods along, taking it’s time in explaining the minute details of the disease C.diff or explaining how parasites live in bird eyeballs.  The whole point of the story (Aza and Daisy reconnecting with Davis so they can find his father for the reward money) gets lost in the middle.  Then it’s as if Green realized he forgot to tie up a loose end and suddenly rushed it all together in the last two chapters.

Ultimately, this book was not a relaxing read.  It’s also not your typical love story.  There’s not going to be a feel good ending where everyone is cured, holds hands, and sings Kumbaya.  If you want one of those stories, just skip this one altogether.