Product Description

First drink, first prank, first friend, first girl, last words! A poignant and moving crossover novel about making friends and growing up from American author, John Green. Miles Halter is fascinated by famous last words -- and tired of his safe, boring and rather lonely life at home. He leaves for boarding school filled with cautious optimism, to seek what the dying poet Francois Rabelais called the "Great Perhaps." Much awaits Miles at Culver Creek, including Alaska Young. Clever, funny, screwed-up, and dead sexy, Alaska will pull Miles into her labyrinth and catapult him into the Great Perhaps. Looking for Alaska brilliantly chronicles the indelible impact one life can have on another.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3125 in Books
• Published on: 2006-07-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 272 pages

Review
"Miles's narration is alive with sweet, self-deprecating humor, and his obvious struggle to tell the story truthfully adds to his believability." School Library Journal "What sings and soars in this gorgeously told tale is Green's mastery of language and the sweet, rough edges of Pudge's voice. Girls will cry and boys will find love, lust, loss and longing in Alaska's vanilla-and-cigarettes scent." Kirkus "This is an amazing first novel by a writer who is young enough to vividly remember his powerful years of high school and he expertly turns remembrance into story." Children's Literature "The novel's chief appeal lies in Miles's well-articulated lust and his initial excitement about being on his own for the first time." Publishers Weekly "Debut novelist and NPR commentator Green perfectly captures the intensity of feeling and despair that defines adolescence in this hip, shocking, and emotionally charged work of fiction." Barnes & Noble

About the Author
John Green attended a boarding school in Alabama not entirely unlike ALASKA's Culver Creek. After graduating from college in 2000, he moved to Chicago, where is is a writer, editor and reviewer, as well as a regular contributor to public radio. LOOKING FOR ALASKA is his first novel.

Customer Reviews

One to read in one sitting-absolutely compelling
I took this book out of the library on a whim one day and I really don't regret it! This book is about friendship and what makes people who they are. Reading this makes you understand that people have so many hidden layers which have been influenced by their past. This book looks at teenage relationships in a way that is remarkably true to life. Most people should be able to identify with the feelings and issues that it deals with. It is also the darker moments in this book that make it such a refreshing, if touching, read.
Looking for Alaska is one of the most well written books that I have read in a long while. One minute it can make you smile the next it can make you feel like crying. I would definitely recommend this to anyone.

Beautiful
I have read this book atleast ten times since I bought it last year and every time I laugh and cry. John Green has created personalities that both genders can relate to, be joyful for and cry for. It is beautifully writen and stays in my head for days after reading it. I generally read fantasy books and when I bought this I was skeptical as to whether it was money well spent. I can clarify now that "Looking For Alaska" is one of my all time favourites and after reading it I could pick it up and start all over again. I would recommend this book to any teenager regardless of their reading tendencies.

Looking For Alaska
I was casually scanning the books in the Young Adult section at Borders, when a guy who worked there came up to me and reccomended this book. I was a little skeptical - he was about 25 and not really the kind I'd imagine reading books aimed at teens, but the way he talked about this book intrigued me entirely. So, as there wasn't anything else interesting me in the slightest, I though - what the hell? Plus, he said that if I didn't like it I could come back and he'd refund me.

I'm so unbelievably glad that I bought it. Green captures the way a teenagers mind works perfectly - and the way he portrayed Miles being hopelessly in love was perfect. Miles is a young boy who joins Culver Creek boarding school in Alabama and befriends Chip 'Colonel' Martin; a sarcastic, trailor-bred intellectual who teaches Miles the way things work.

Immediately, I was curious with the he set out the chapters; divided into two halves - before and after a defining moment in Mile's life. It wasn't soppy or unrealistic - it's a story about a normal boy falling in love with a girl who - in his eyes - is perfect. The main girl Alaska is an endearing character - the author makes you want to know more about her; she's the epitomy of 'cool', but her underlying story gives her more depth, and you realise that there's a lot more to her and that her smile is a mask for her past. Filled with drinking, pranks and cigarettes - Looking For Alaska gives an insight into what teenage life is all about, and the harrowing reality of how precious life is.