Review: Fangirl by Rainbow Rowel

Rating: ★★★★★★★★★☆  9/10

Quick Snippet: Cath and her twin sister Wren are finally headed off to college, but it's not how Cath had pictured: Wren has requested they live in separate dorms. This would be perfectly fine if Cath thought she'd be able to survive without her sister, which she doesn't, and therefore she is launched completely out of her comfort zone into crazy college life, alone. One of the only aspects of her life that makes her feel safe is her love for the Simon Snow series, which Wren has mostly given up but Cath cannot let go of. 

Recommendation: I would recommend this to any teen fiction-lover out there, male or female. 

Review: AH! I absolutely love this book. Rainbow Rowell is such a perfect writer, I don't know how she does it. Cath's character develops so swimmingly that you can almost predict what she'll think about certain situations. The novel completely captured everything I love about reading and folded it into a nice, 400-page package. 

One reason I love this book so much is because I can relate to it. I'm a twin, I have an obsession with a series very similar to Simon Snow (cough, Harry Potter), I love to write (although I am nowhere near as good at writing as Cath is), and I have a slight fear of college. This novel made me feel absolutely fine about all of those qualities because Rainbow Rowell almost made them seem normal. If I were to make a goal of how I want my life to be in two years, it would be to somehow embody Cath's life. I'm not kidding.

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What a huge plot twist, for Cath to end up with Levi! At least, I thought it was a plot twist. Levi really is a likable guy, though. The pair are really quite opposite in personality, but they still fit together really well.

I'll admit, I was rooting for Nick up until the little spat he and Cath had. I'm glad Cath stood up for her writing, because that's something I probably wouldn't have done. I'm also proud of her for not letting Nick use his (their) story in the Underclassman Prize, which is also something I wouldn't have had the guts to do. 

What really makes Rowell a genius is that she wrote a book about a human who is very similar to the audience who reads books. I'm not saying only introverted book-lovers read books, but you have to admit, the majority of book-lovers are similar to Cath. There are so many novels out there about so many types of girls, and now there is finally a novel about the reader, so to speak. Very cool.

One aspect that makes Fangirl unique is the addition of excerpts from either Simon Snow books or from fanfiction by Cath to introduce each chapter. This nice touch was completely unneccessary, and the novel would have been great without it, but it enhanced the text in a way that not many other books can.

Overall, Fangirl is one of those books that left me feeling empty after I had finished it because it had incorporated itself into my life so well. I'm dead set on buying this to add to my bookshelf, just so that I will never have to feel empty without it.