A NOTE FROM GREG GAINES, AUTHOR OF THIS BOOK
I have no idea how to write this stupid book.
Can I just be honest with you for one second? This is the literal truth. When I first started writing this book, I tried to start it with the sentence “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.” I genuinely thought that I could start this book that way. I just figured, it’s a classic book-starting sentence. But then I couldn’t even figure out how you were supposed to follow that up. I started at the computer for an hour and it was all I could do not to have a colossal freak-out. In desperation I tried messing with the punctuation and italicization like:
It was the best of times? And it was the worst of times?!!
What the hell does that even mean? Why would you even think to do that? You wouldn’t, unless you had a fungus eating your brain, which I guess I probably have.
This is how long it took me to realize I was going to have to force myself not to stay up all night and read this book in one go. I mean, come on. This voice? I didn’t even know who Greg was, but I was in. Honestly, I was probably in at “I have no idea how to write this stupid book.” So many questions! Why is he writing it then? Is he being forced to? What happened that was so important or awesome or scary or whatever that he decided to sit down in front of a computer and force himself to think of words while at the same time acknowledging that he might have a brain fungus?
And then I got to page 2.
I do actually want to say one other thing before we get started with this horrifyingly inane book. You may have already figured out that it’s about girl who had cancer. So there’s a chance you’re thinking “Awesome! This is going to be a wise and insightful story about love and death and growing up. It’s probably going to make me cry literally the entire time. I am so fired up right now.” If that is an accurate representation of your thoughts, you should probably try to smush this book into a garbage disposal and then run away. Because here’s the thing: I learned absolutely nothing from Rachel’s leukemia. In fact, I probably became stupider about life because of the whole thing.
Again, I don’t know who Greg is, but I’m in.
Read more about how awesome this book is over on my blog. It’s one of my favorites this year.
Cannonball Read V 