Looking For Alaska is another one of John Green's amazing books.
Here is a summary of Looking For Alaska:
Miles Halter is fascinated by famous last words–and tired of his safe life at home. He leaves for boarding school 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.
Like most of John Green's books, there is such meaning into them. Many adults see teenagers as arrogant and maybe disobedient. What I love about the book is it states that yes, teens do stupid things, but when a teenagers does something they shouldn't, sometimes there is a deeper meaning to it, sometimes teenagers do things in act of passion or love but others just do not see it that way.
In the book it states the last words of Simon Bolivar which were, "Damn it. How will I ever get out of this labyrinth!" I remember speaking to my mom of this, the labyrinth of suffering. I was telling her that everyone goes through the labyrinth but many want to just go straight and fast (as Alaska wrote in her book). There is no way of getting out of the labyrinth but every turn you make is something learned, something appreciated, something worth experiencing. She then had a story to tell of her mother, of the last moments her mother had breast cancer. My mom has learned so much from her mother, she's told me that although my grandmother was sick she still had enough energy to teach my mom such meaningful things. My mom was hurt, she suffered through the months of her mothers passing but she appreciates all the things she has learned from her.
"The Buddha said that suffering was caused by desire, we'd learned, and that the cessation of desire meant the cessation of suffering. When you stopped wishing things wouldn't fall apart, you'd stop suffering when they did." Now this quote may have a different meaning but to me it states that basically in order to feel happy one must know what pain feels like. I told my mom, everyone will suffer (of course different than others) and suffering will never just vanish. She and my father are in this, lets just say teaching place, and they learn of every religion, learn of yoga and great diets. What she learned is that you can stop suffering, that it is possible. Through my mothers great explanations I grew to believe, yes it is possible to stop suffering. The question now is, how? Will there be different solutions for everyone?
John Green's book has brought my mom and I closer together. It, although caused my mom and I to cry, gave my mom the opportunity to tell me more of her life and see life in an even wider view. If it weren't for this book I would have not learned more of my grandmother. I appreciate reading these sort of books and I love having the opportunity to tell my mom of these books, because every time I tell her the message/meaning in books I read, she has a story to tell. Through those stories I have learned more of my mother and her life than ever before.
And I thank you, John Green, for that.
After all this time, it seems to me like straight and fast is the only way out- but I choose the labyrinth. The labyrinth blows, but I choose it.