Author: Rainbow Rowell
Publication Date: September 10, 2013
Genre: Young Adult/New Adult, Contemporary, Romance, Coming Of Age
Add to: Goodreads / Amazon / Book Depository
A coming-of-age tale of fan fiction, family and first love.
Cath is a Simon Snow fan.
Okay, the whole world is a Simon Snow fan . . .
But for Cath, being a fan is her life — and she’s really good at it. She and her twin sister, Wren, ensconced themselves in the Simon Snow series when they were just kids; it’s what got them through their mother leaving.
Reading. Rereading. Hanging out in Simon Snow forums, writing Simon Snow fan fiction, dressing up like the characters for every movie premiere.
Cath’s sister has mostly grown away from fandom, but Cath can’t let go. She doesn’t want to.
Now that they’re going to college, Wren has told Cath she doesn’t want to be roommates. Cath is on her own, completely outside of her comfort zone. She’s got a surly roommate with a charming, always-around boyfriend, a fiction-writing professor who thinks fan fiction is the end of the civilized world, a handsome classmate who only wants to talk about words . . . And she can’t stop worrying about her dad, who’s loving and fragile and has never really been alone.
For Cath, the question is: Can she do this?
Can she make it without Wren holding her hand? Is she ready to start living her own life? Writing her own stories?
And does she even want to move on if it means leaving Simon Snow behind?
My Thoughts
I've been waiting for this book and was looking forward to it after probably because I read and loved her other book: Eleanor and Park. And I might read Attachments some time this year. Now for Fangirl, this book was a slow read for me but it wasn't the kind of slow reading where I had to put the book down because it's bad, it's the kind where I had to take time to reread some lines to understand the characters. Especially Cath.
Cath is a college freshman and just moved in since it's her first day, and her twin's named Wren, but she's not used to doing things without her sister by her side. She's one big Simon Snow fangirl, hence, she writes fanfiction and she gets absorbed into this fictional world like any big-time fangirl (or just simply put as someone who really loves the characters and the world-building behind it). Now she's away and in college: she tries not to cling to her twin that much, constantly worries about their dad back home, seems to feel uneasy around people (or in her words: strangers), still continues to be Simon Snow's biggest fan. And then this guy, Levi, just happened to appear.
To be honest, I got so frustrated over Cath. I can relate to her during my first few days in college: scared to be around people that I ended up not leaving my room or just do homework and read a book to avoid human interaction. But the thing about Cath and this personality of hers is that she pushes away her newly-met people who wanted to offer her some help or encouragement. That's not nice and considering they're telling the truth and seemed to dislike the idea of seeing her lonely or not eating much. And she also seemed to be so attached to her twin that at times, her stubbornness is already bothering and irritating me. Her twin needed some shaking-her-senses out too. Cath worries too much for their dad as well and whenever I read how worried she is, it makes me want to blame their dad too. Not that he's a bad parent, he really just needed to get over his loneliness. I know that being lonely is never a good thing, it never is, but he can't expect his daughters to stay forever. I mean I know he's hurt from everything that happened in the family and he's dealing with other big things but still, it's affecting and more on Cath.
Levi is the character that I really like in this book. He's not the perfect handsome guy that every girl in school would melt into a puddle of hearts whenever he walks by. He's just simple and smiling. Too smiling. Sometimes his smile kind of weird me out but I handled it. He's a genuine kind of guy that I'm really glad he's part of the picture in Cath's frame of life. Bonus points for his sweetness and his cuteness when he's all nervous.
Overall, I still liked it. The progress was good for me and I'm happy to see Cath starting to really come out of her age. Realistic and imperfect flawed characters that I happen to enjoy reading and knowing despite all the frustrations they seemed to emit out of me.
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