Authors: John Green and David Levithan
What it’s about (in 75 words or fewer): Will Grayson is in high school and friends with Tiny, the "world's largest person who is really, really gay." Will is dealing with Tiny's dramatic life of falling in love every two seconds and is matched up with Jane. Meanwhile, another Will Grayson, the same age, is stranded in Chicago after being catfished by his best friend. He's bummed, so Will#1 sets him up with Tiny, who's thrilled to date the other "Will Grayson."
What I think (in 250 words or fewer): First, I'd like to say that I'm a big fan of the Greens' Crash Course series but not a fan of Green's books. Katherines was okay; TFIOS was yuck; Alaska was . . . forgettable, since I'm pretty sure I read it, but . . . ? On the other hand, I've liked most Levithan books I've read.
I read Will Grayson a couple years ago and decided to re-read it for review. I still don't care for it.
Green writes the parts from the POV of Will Grayson #1. WG#1 complains all the time about Tiny, who is his only friend. Will doesn't like Jane, thinks Jane "looks like a puppy," is mad because Jane doesn't like him, and then suddenly like likes Jane, and WHY is she bothering with him??
Levithan writes from the POV of Will Grayson #2. WG#2 apparently doesn't believe in the SHIFT key, but he uses every other punctuation mark. WG#2 is a more sympathetic character: he is in the closet and clinically depressed. WG#2 begins dating Tiny, who falls in love with pretty much any and every boy.
Tiny's character is a big gay stereotype, which wouldn't necessarily bother me (I've known my fair share of Tiny's), but Tiny has written Tiny Dancer, a super-flamboyant-over-the-top musical about his life that he is staging at his school. I just can't suspend my disbelief enough to imagine a school going along with this (unless in Levithan's Boy Meets Boy) and the cheesiness of the ending belongs in the 80's-est of 80's movies.
Will Grayson, Will Grayson is on the 2011 Rainbow Book List.
Hold Me Closer: The Tiny Cooper Story is on the 2016 Rainbow Book List.
My grade: C-/D+. But lots of people I know LOVE this book with an all-capital-letters LOVE, so don't necessarily trust my review. I also read Hold Me Closer, which is the text of Tiny's musical, and although it made me laugh a few times, I also thought it was meh.
Writing this review has made me feel like a 90-year-old lady who just doesn't get them new-fangled YA books. Also, you kids get off my lawn.
My favorite quotes:
- "You like someone who can't like you back because unrequited love can be survived in a way once-requited love cannot" (hardback edition, pg. 43).
- "'I met a guy named Will Grayson in that porn store,' I say. 'I was there to use my fake ID, and he was there to meet his fake boyfriend.'
'Jesus, if I'd known that was gonna happen, I would've skipped the concert'" (pg. 129). - "Wah-wah, Jane doesn't like me even though I don't like her. Wah-wah, Tiny named a character after me in his play. Like, there are people in the world with real problems, you know? You gotta keep it in perspective" (pg. 156).
- "i'm tiny cooper, and i've been dating this will grayson for four weeks, two days, and eighteen hours now. if you hadn't been such an evil, selfish, deceitful, vindictive frenemy to him, we would have never met. it just goes to show, if you try to ruin someone's life, it only gets better. you just don't get to be a part of it" (pg. 237).
Other reviews: The Odyssey and Book Smugglers
This book is available in the Greensboro Public Library.
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