Book Review: Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell

Okay. I agonized over this review for a long time, and this is the only way I could figure out how to do it. Herein is contained a review for the book Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell. It is written from the point of view of myself, at this current time, to a past me wondering whether or not she should read the book.

Dearest Past Me:

I know you’re ramping up for another NaNoWrimo. You’ve set an impressive goal for yourself (and sh, spoilers, but you’ll make it. Did you think you wouldn’t, with a reward like that?) and you’re just waiting for the clock to turn to November.

And you’re reading the pep talks, excitedly soaking in their knowledge and wisdom. And you found one from Rainbow Rowell. You remember that name, sort of. Last year, didn’t she write a pep talk? Something about her book… ooh. You see the title, and…

Fangirl.

It was about an introverted girl going to college, moving out of her comfort zone, and learning how to get on without her fandom. You were already sort of invested by that time, and just knowing that it was written by a fellow Wrimo— you had to read it.

You look it up, of course. After all, we read very well, and we remember almost everything we read, so it wouldn’t make sense to read something we don’t want to remember, right? And not just having a badly worded, awkward string of words in your brain, but even if it were the best novel ever written, if it upheld values that you do not, you would regret it.

So, you were somewhat disappointed to learn that Fangirl was about a slash writer. ‘Ah well’, you said. ‘I didn’t need to read it anyway.’ But you’d wanted to.

You moved on, achieved your goal (and if it was harder than it should have been, it was entirely your own fault for procrastinating). Then you piddled around in December, and somehow or another again found Fangirl.

You sighed and ordered it from the library, knowing you’d regret it if you didn’t. You were also probably procrastinating on editing your novel, come to think of it.

So you settled in to read it, and found that you should have anticipated the language right of the bat. Honestly, you should have seen it coming. College, I-want-to-be-cool, it should have been apparent. But it wasn’t too bad, so you continued. You found that, as expected, you quickly identified with Cath, the main character, as she set up her desk and fandom posters and laptop, and sitting there was relaxed in this new environment. You’d done much the same thing when you house-sat, several months ago.

You loved the little inserts of the (fictional) Simon Snow books. You smiled at Cath’s rather extensive introversion. You wanted her to succeed, to break out of her shell. You loved the little excerpts of the fics she was writing (though, of course, you felt awkward when it was even just a little bit slashy). You really wanted her to succeed in her Fiction Writing class.

You didn’t really like the one character, but you knew she had to be there to forcibly break Cath out of her shell if need be. Ah, she needed it, so it happened. And then you began to worry, when it seemed the focus of Cath’s growing up and into herself was going to involve boys. ‘Should have known’, you said to yourself, eyeing the modern setting with distrust. But really, what do you know about it? You’d never been in love or dated (we find the concept too much like preparation for divorce to even want to), so maybe this was normal. This whole thing was like an entirely different culture.

You settled in, and found yourself cheering on Cath. You felt for these characters, and you lived along with them, and you only wished they did not make the mistakes they made. You knew it made them more realistic, but still… During one scene, you grinned like a madwoman and whispered, ‘Never let a shipper write’, but then took a look at yourself and your huge smile and amended your statement. “Always let a shipper write.’

And then… ah, but you should have seen it coming, and maybe you did. You realized college was famous for several things. Partying and… land, we’re still too shy to say it. “You know”. Not that it was explicit or anything, but there was still the fact that it was there, and that Cath and her friends viewed it as normal and not anything to get worked up over. You didn’t like that. You especially didn’t like how they—and it hurt to think that maybe most of your peers— viewed virginity as something to lose. Ah, we still don’t like that.

No, and by the time the ending rolled around, you were incredibly conflicted. On the one hand, the ‘just-viewing-as-a-fellow-author’ hand, the book was wonderful. It was well-written, the character arcs were believable and more importantly gripping, the plot moved forward just as it should, and everything in this vein made Fangirl a wonderful book.

But on the other hand, the Christian hand, the one where we review books and movies with regard to the morals they uphold— ah, on that hand, Fangirl falls short. And we’ve spent over a week thinking about it and Pointedly Not Writing a Review About It, and just spent most of the free time this day held hashing out several versions of a review, until we hit upon the brilliant idea to write a letter to our past self. And all we can say, really, is—

Write your own.

You don’t need to read it, and you probably shouldn’t. It’s not a bad book, but it’s so maddeningly gray and the line is so infuriatingly blurred that you’ll still be able to say, with a mind on Paul’s verse and the guidelines there (true, pure, lovely, honorable, of good report, etc), that… oh, we can’t even tell you to look it up on Wikipedia. This book is driving you crazy right now, and reading the above review it occurs to me that you’ll still want to read it. You’ll have to, by now. It’s so…accurate, in how it portrays a fangirl. But it’s just the whole dating thing that you still can’t get over. The fact that she didn’t wait, even though he seemed to be one to wait for. He was there for her when she needed him to be, and…

I still don’t know.

But, past me…

Know that it is going to be a small culture shock. Know that she holds a different worldview than you. Know that you and she are similar. Know that you don’t need to read it. Know that, if you do read it, the smiling moments where the author understands the fandom, understands fanfiction like you don’t, the moments where Cath and Spoiler are interacting and setting off your shipping detector and everything is fluffiness, know that those moments are barely making up for the moments where she makes poor decisions on the spur of the moment, and where that is left open to interpretation by the author as good or bad (though she does let Cath’s mind tell her that her logic is miserably flawed). Know that you still don’t know what to think about this. Again.

Write your own.

Really. A Christian fangirl’s struggles…your struggles…come on. Next November, you should give that back to your fandoms. Get to know yourself a bit more.

But regarding Fangirl… aha. I’ve got it.

I wish I could recommend it to you. I really do. But I can’t, not wholeheartedly, even though I still want to. Land, but how she understands us… I can’t wholeheartedly recommend it. For better or for worse, only part of me (a strong part, the one that has a fanfiction.net account and wants to learn how to play I Am the Doctor on piano and discovered writing motivation from Hebrews) recommends it.

I just want you to know that.

--Sincerely, Future You

(Still not entirely sure about this, but it's bugging me enough that I need to get it out. Also not sure why my inner editor will only review books in second person or whatever you call that...)