Hands down, I am a self confessed John Green addict and a massive nerd-fighter. Be it The Fault in our Stars or Looking for Alaska, I love each and every one of his novels.
Joining John Green were two authors I'd never heard of before, Maureen Johnson and Lauren Myracle. As each of them are stories in their own right, I faced a challenge as to how to review them. Although saying that they were a challenge, the same can be said for Maureen Johnson's short story, The Jubilee Express.
A girl called Jubilee has parents obsessed with something called the Flobie Santa Village (I originally thought this was an actual thing in America, but it turns out it's something made just for this novel), so much so that her name comes from the Jubilee Hall in the village. Her parents are so obsessed that they are mistaken for mob at the department store. Jubilee is then sent on a train on Christmas Eve to Florida to stay with her grandparents because her big-shot neighbour lawyer Sam is unable to get them out of county jail. The train gets stuck in Gracetown, which becomes the backdrop for all the stories, and when they announce the train wouldn't be moving again until morning, Jubilee heads over to a Waffle House, and it's there she meets a whole host of people including Tinfoil Guy (who is featured in Lauren's story as well), 14 cheerleaders and a Korean manager of the Waffle House, Keun. He comes back later as well, as does the entire Waffle House and those cheerleaders. What I like about the book was the fact that all three authors use the same surroundings, characters and theme: love.
However, I say it's a challenge because of many things. First off, Maureen seems to have a great deal of knowledge around the fact that many people think Jubilee is a perfect name for a stripper, including at one point mentioning a possibility of asking whether she used baby or nut oil for her routine around the pole. This completely ruined the character for me and the story had no original plot: Jubilee meets Stuart, they pretend to do stuff together, she breaks up with her current boyfriend, they get together. This is in no way an exaggeration when I say I have nothing positive to say about this short story. Please do stick with this book though, because from there, we move onto John Green's short story, A Cheertastic Christmas Miracle.
There are three people, the Duke, JP and Tobin. The Duke is a girl however earning her nickname through the fact that she doesn't look like a girl; namely she has "no cleavage" (I quote). Keun gives them a call during their James Bond movie marathon and tells them that 14 cheerleaders (told you they'd come back!) are at the Waffle House and they are dying to play Twister, but as soon as he got off the phone, two other groups of guys would also be given the chance. They only had room left for another car full of people so they'd have to race for it. The story is then based on the rush of these three people, one of which really doesn't care about these other girls because, surprise surprise, she is a straight girl herself, and the story eventually ends on a twist. I really don't want to spoil it for you though.
John Green provided a story that was packed full of jokes, one of which, and I won't say which, left me laughing for literally ages afterwards, maybe just because I have that sort of sense of humour. The storyline had a vague reminiscence of An Abundance of Katherines, what with the road trip ending with a twist. But it was a good storyline. I am however finding it hard to comment further on this short story because, whilst I didn't find it as much of a chore to read as The Jubilee Express, there isn't actually much else to comment on. Which brings us to the final short story, The Patron Saint of Pigs, by Lauren Myracle.
This was my favourite out of all of the short stories. Addie is hung up over her past boyfriend Jeb, because they broke up after it went so, so wrong when Charlie sat and listened to her talk at a Christmas party and then seduced her into kissing him. Even though she was drunk, she made Jeb hate her and she made them break up. This problem even ruins her Christmas, but the story really starts on Boxing Day when she starts her early morning shift at the Gracetown Starbucks, with her rulebook loving manager Christina. Throughout the day she's distraught with her boyfriend problems and an old woman called Mayzie.
This was the most packed storyline out of all of them, something I really appreciated. Addie was a real reflection of a teenage girl in this type of situation, and I really enjoyed the heart warming style Lauren gave. I'll say it again as well, I enjoyed the recurrence of the characters from the previous short stories; Tinfoil Guy in particular, who I gather has no idea he's wearing the tinfoil. Keun was mentioned, and Jubilee & Stuart, from Maureen's story, showed up at the Starbucks to create a mush of all the characters, adding to a spirit the book seemed to have.
My only problem? Well, let's put it this way: every other word was Starbucks. With no offence intended, I did become increasingly concerned as to what length Lauren had gone to in order to understand what seemed like every policy that Starbucks had. It was literally an advert for Starbucks, and that ruined a lot of the story for me.
Overall, for all three stories, I rate it as good. I recommend it to anyone, because it really does show a brilliant contrast between the authors in the book. I found that interesting. Don't get me wrong, it's a great book. I just hope I'm not the only one who's sad that John Green has not got another book out for me to read yet.
• Buy this book at the Guardian Bookshop
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