An Abundance of Katherines

Infobox Book |
name = An Abundance of Katherines
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption =
author = John Green
cover_artist =
country = United States
language = English
series =
genre = Young adult novel
publisher = Dutton
release_date = 2006
media_type = Print (Paperback)
pages = 256 pp
isbn = ISBN 0525476881
preceded_by =
followed_by =

"An Abundance of Katherines" is a young adult novel by John Green. Released in 2006, it was a finalist for the Michael L. Printz Award.

An Abundance of Katherines is about many things: heartbreak, friends, family, and math. Most importantly, however, it is about a young man who takes a road trip to find himself. The literal journey works well for the metaphorical one, of course, and is a familiar storytelling device.

Plot summary

Colin Singleton used to be a prodigy. Used to be, because now he's a recent high school graduate, and what means "gifted prodigy" at age 2 means simply "smart" at age 18. Not only that, but his girlfriend Katherine just dumped him. In his lifetime, Colin has dated 19 girls named Katherine - never Kathy, never Catherine, always K-a-t-h-e-r-i-n-e - and been dumped by all but one.

Stuck in that between-time, between boy and man, between high school and college, and positively heartbroken, he goes on a road trip with his best (and only) friend, the blunt and unabashed Hassan. After following a sign for the grave of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the corpse that started WWI, Colin and Hassan end up in Carver County, Tennessee, in a little town called Gutshot. There, among others, they meet a kind girl named Lindsey Lee Wells, who defies all Colin's expecations of women and the world; her group of friends, whom Colin and Hassan humorously refer to using acronyms (i.e. TOC, The Other Colin, JATT, Jeans Are Too Tight, and SOCT Short One Chewing Tobacco); and her mother, who opens her home to the two boys.

Colin seeks a Eureka moment, some stupendous discovery to bring meaning and significance to his life. He eventually finds it in Gutshot -- however, it is not the mathematical revelation he was expecting, but rather a personal breakthrough, the culmination to his journey of self-discovery.

Trivia

*In the novel, Colin and Hassan say "fug" instead of "fuck" as an homage to Norman Mailer. It is explained in the book that Mailer replaced every instance of the word fuck in his novel The Naked and the Dead to "fug" in order to please a publisher, who refused to publish it on the basis that it had too much profanity.

*On an [http://www.brotherhood2.com/?p=19 episode of Brotherhood 2.0] , the author's brother Hank Green (who is married to a Katherine) made fun of the novel by calling it "An Abundance of Katherines... in my pants." Adding "in my pants" (or slight variations thereof) to the ends of book titles to make them more entertaining is a common running gag in the series.

*In the novel, Katherine XIX has a dog named Fireball Roberts, which is from the book "the Last Good Kiss" by James Crumley. The first line is this: "When I finally caught up with Abraham Trahearne, he was drinking beer with an alcoholic bulldog named Fireball Roberts in a ramshackle joint just outside of Sonoma, California, drinking the heart right out of a fine spring afternoon." John Green's dog is also called Fireball Roberts, otherwise known as Willy or Bubbles the Nerdfighting Puppy.

Awards

An Abundance of Katherines was a 2007 Michael L. Printz Award Honor Book

Film Adaption

John Green mentioned in Brotherhood 2.0 on 10 December 2007 that the book is going to be a movie. (Someday) The reason he said someday is because he believes it is going to take a long time. Green has been asked to write the screenplay.

External links

* [http://www.unshelved.com/archive.aspx?strip=20070520/ Unshelved Book Club on "An Abundance of Katherines"]