This little book is exactly what the title says it will be.
It is the story of our narrator, his friend Earl, and a girl dying of cancer
(Rachel-but she may as well go unnamed because she has a surprisingly little
part in the story). Our narrator, Greg, is a social skater, friendly with every
clique but never connected with one group more than another. He prefers to
remain an obscure part of the crowd, lest someone get close to him and hate
what they see. His only friend is an angry, short guy named Earl. Since they
discovered their shared interest in movies during childhood, they have been
creating mediocre films of their own.
Greg's whole life changes when Rachel is diagnosed with
leukemia. He used to be friends with Rachel when they were younger; her mom is
a friend of his mom’s. His mom insists that he spend time with Rachel during
her time of trouble, befriend her, and bring comfort and encouragement to her,
although the severity of her condition is initially unknown. At his mother's
demands, Greg comes to find that he actually enjoys spending time with Rachel
because he can make her laugh so easily and she is probably the only person in
the world who likes his movies.
I have to be honest with you: I did not like Rachel. This is
a terrible thing to say about a dying person, even if they are fictional, but
it is true. She is two-dimensional and bland, just present in the story for the
convenience of it. She does not feel like a real person. Aside from her posters
of half-naked celebrities and the vague "she used to read books,"
there are no interests, no facts, and no past events. It's like she has no
history.
Let me rephrase my earlier comment: it's not that I don't
like Rachel. I don't like how she is portrayed. And, in the sense of this book,
she is portrayed through Greg's eyes. Maybe her vapidness can be written off as
Greg simply not attempting to get to know her, but he sure seems to be trying
very hard. Aside from her snorting laughter, this girl really gives him nothing
in the give-and-take of conversation.
I don't particularly like many of the other characters
either. I feel as though most of them are caricatures of stereotypes. His mom,
his best friend Earl, even his father as the nutty professor. Greg has everyone
labeled into a group in his social ecosystem, and it definitely shows when he
tells this story. Now that I think about it, nobody breaks out of the status
quo.
Greg himself reminds me a whole lot of Holden Caulfield from
The Catcher in the Rye. He is funny
from the beginning, cynical, candid. Despite all my complaints, I cannot deny
that Greg is funny. In fact, a whole
lot of his quips did make me laugh out loud to the point of embarrassment. He
uses dirty, middle school boy humor, and I guess I'm immature enough to
appreciate it. It felt like my sense of humor was on autopilot, that I was
compulsively cackling at gross things.
But many passages were good examples of "too much of a
good thing." Like, Greg would say something funny and then take it way too
far. He would exhaust it to the point where the original joke was no longer
funny. Not to mention the general dirty talk. I’m not one to quickly say this, but the profanity in this book seems a little excessive to me.
One thing I do like about this story is the sheer lack of
romance. Heck, Greg doesn't even TRY to find a girlfriend or love interest
because he's so hung up himself being undateable. It does get a little old
listening to his self-hating rants. And he absolutely refuses to accept any
compliment ever, whether or not said compliment is true.
Even when he is realizing that he never knew Rachel or that
he should have done more for Rachel or that the movie that he created for Rachel was more about him
than her, that does not change the trajectory of the story. He uses these
selfish self-realizations to make even more selfish self-realizations and it
never turns out to be more than Greg figuring out Greg.
I'm not saying that this is not a realistic book, and I'm
certainly not saying I didn't enjoy
reading it. I just had a whole lot of problems with it. The main problem was
that Rachel is painted into being as so much of a non-person that she hardly
seems alive. Her only purpose in this story is to push Greg onto the path to
fix his own life.
Greg is open and honest about all of his faults. He says
from the beginning, “I learned
absolutely nothing from Rachel’s leukemia.” But, see, I think he should
have learned something. I think there should have been a lesson. I guess he
learns more about what he wants in life, like pursuing a degree in film, but he
doesn’t seem to learn much about the world or the other people in it.
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