Looking for Alaska by John Green

1. Green, John. 2006. LOOKING FOR ALASKA. New York, NY: Puffin. ISBN-20: 014241221X
2. PLOT SUMMARY
Up until the summer before Junior year, Miles life has been as exciting as vanilla pudding. Looking for a change in his life, he decides to attend his father’s alma mater, a boarding prep school for children of wealthy parents. Miles is not disappointed when he meets his roommate, The Colonel, a poor genius on scholarship and Alaska, a brilliant, wild and unpredictable beauty with whom he instantly falls in love. The first half of the book entails Miles trying to find himself amidst bigger-than-life characters. The second half of the book involves Miles’ quest to find meaning in the aftermath of a tragedy.
3. CRITICAL ANALYSIS
Looking for Alaska is a complex book that explores many issues young adults struggle with including identity, friendship, sexuality, peer pressure, and the meaning of life. Green weaves the heavy themes around Miles’ odd penchant for famous people’s last words. Miles explains his desire to go to boarding school to his parents by explaining, "Francois Rabelais. He was a poet. And his last words were "I go to seek a Great Perhaps." That's why I'm going. So I don't have to wait until I die to start seeking a Great Perhaps." Green has an understanding of the common adolescent desire to do something bigger than life.
Alaska is an enigma. She is beautiful, charismatic, self-destructive, impulsive, and moody. Her behavior is difficult to understand until Alaska opens up to her friends about the wound of her mother’s death. This tragic event has both tormented Alaska and has played a defining role in her life. Ultimately, Alaska’s own death is directly linked to her mother’s death, her inability to forgive herself, and her self-punishment for something that was out of her control. Miles transformation and maturity is evident when he has the realization, “…He was gone, and I did not have time to tell him what I had just now realized: that I forgave him, and that she forgave us, and that we had to forgive to survive in the labyrinth. There were so many of us who would have to live with things done and things left undone that day.”
Looking for Alaska is appropriate for older, mature adolescents and provides an abundance of material for discussion.
4. BOOK AWARDS AND EXCEPT(S)
Michael L. Printz Award Winner
School Library Journal: “Miles's narration is alive with sweet, self-deprecating humor, and his obvious struggle to tell the story truthfully adds to his believability. Like Phineas in John Knowles's A Separate Peace(S & S, 1960), Green draws Alaska so lovingly, in self-loathing darkness as well as energetic light, that readers mourn her loss along with her friends.”
5. CONNECTIONS
Henke, Kevin. 2005. OLIVE’S OCEAN. ISBN-10: 0060535458
Perkins, Lynne Rae. 2007. CRISS CROSS. ISBN-10: 0060092742
Kadohata, Cynthia. 2006. KIRA-KIRA. ISBN-10: 0689856407