Editors Reads Verdict
Green's quirkiest and most intellectually playful novel: the theorem-building conceit is both funnier and smarter than it sounds, and the portrait of post-prodigy anxiety — the fear of peaking at fifteen — is Green's most specific and most honest theme.
What We Loved
- The theorem-building conceit is funnier and more mathematically genuine than it has any right to be
- Colin's post-prodigy anxiety — the fear of having already peaked — is Green's most specific and honest emotional subject
- Hassan is one of Green's best supporting characters: funny, grounded, and his own complete person
- Gutshot, Tennessee is rendered with the affectionate specificity of a writer who actually looked
Minor Drawbacks
- Colin is less immediately likeable than Green's other protagonists — his self-absorption is the point, but it can be wearing
- The mathematical appendix delights some readers and alienates others — there is no middle ground
- The romantic resolution is the least convincing element of the novel
Key Takeaways
- → Being a prodigy is not the same as being exceptional at the thing you actually want to be exceptional at
- → The patterns we find in past relationships are usually patterns we imposed rather than discovered
- → Road trips have literary utility because they remove characters from the environments that define them
- → Intelligence deployed as self-protection eventually prevents the self from being protected
- → The question of whether you matter is not answerable by achievement — only by relationship
| Author | John Green |
|---|---|
| Publisher | Dutton |
| Pages | 256 |
| Published | September 21, 2006 |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Young Adult, Coming of Age, Comedy, Romance |
| Difficulty | Beginner |
| Best For | John Green readers curious about his full catalog; YA readers who enjoy intellectually playful novels with footnotes and appendices; readers interested in prodigy anxiety and post-high-school uncertainty. |
An Abundance of Katherines Review
John Green’s second novel is his most deliberately strange and his most underrated. Where Looking for Alaska announced a serious literary ambition and The Fault in Our Stars became a cultural phenomenon, An Abundance of Katherines sits quietly in the catalog as the book Green fans recommend when they want to show someone a different angle on his work.
Colin Singleton is a child prodigy — the kind who could read at two, who learned twelve languages by sixteen, who appeared on television as a curiosity — and he has been dumped by nineteen girls, all of them named Katherine. The novel begins the morning after Katherine XIX ends things and follows Colin and his best friend Hassan on a road trip to Gutshot, Tennessee, a small town where a factory produces the drawstrings used in almost all American sweatpants. Colin spends the trip trying to derive a mathematical theorem that could predict the outcome of any romantic relationship.
The Theorem
The theorem is both joke and thesis. Green actually derived the equations — they are reproduced in a mathematical appendix at the novel’s end — and the underlying question is genuine: can pattern recognition in past relationships tell you anything true about future ones, or are the patterns you find only the projections of your current state of mind? The answer the novel arrives at is characteristically Green: mathematical models of human feeling are reductive and also the kind of thing a brilliant, emotionally avoidant nineteen-year-old would spend six months on.
Colin and the Post-Prodigy Fear
The novel’s emotional core is Colin’s terror of ordinariness. He was exceptional at fifteen in a way that adults noticed and celebrated. He is not certain he will be exceptional at twenty-five in any way anyone will notice. This is a specific and rarely examined adolescent anxiety — not the fear of failure but the fear of having already peaked — and Green handles it with honesty and actual wit.
Hassan
Colin’s best friend Hassan is a larger, more religiously observant, funnier person who punctures Colin’s self-absorption with the casual precision of someone who has been doing it for years. He is one of Green’s best supporting creations, fully inhabited and not subordinated to the protagonist’s growth.
Our rating: 3.9/5 — Green’s most intellectually playful novel and his most honest treatment of post-prodigy anxiety, best appreciated by readers willing to engage with both the theorem and the footnotes.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is "An Abundance of Katherines" about?
Colin Singleton has dated nineteen girls named Katherine and been dumped by all nineteen. A child prodigy now between his last Katherine and his uncertain future, Colin and his best friend Hassan embark on a post-graduation road trip to Gutshot, Tennessee, where Colin tries to derive a mathematical theorem to predict the rise and fall of romantic relationships.
Who should read "An Abundance of Katherines"?
John Green readers curious about his full catalog; YA readers who enjoy intellectually playful novels with footnotes and appendices; readers interested in prodigy anxiety and post-high-school uncertainty.
What are the key takeaways from "An Abundance of Katherines"?
Being a prodigy is not the same as being exceptional at the thing you actually want to be exceptional at The patterns we find in past relationships are usually patterns we imposed rather than discovered Road trips have literary utility because they remove characters from the environments that define them Intelligence deployed as self-protection eventually prevents the self from being protected The question of whether you matter is not answerable by achievement — only by relationship
Is "An Abundance of Katherines" worth reading?
Green's quirkiest and most intellectually playful novel: the theorem-building conceit is both funnier and smarter than it sounds, and the portrait of post-prodigy anxiety — the fear of peaking at fifteen — is Green's most specific and most honest theme.
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