Me and Earl and the Dying Girl - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1760290440 ISBN 13: 9781760290443

Publisher: Allen & Unwin, 2015

Synopsis

Greg Gaines is the last master of high school espionage, able to disappear at will into any social environment. He has only one friend, Earl, and together they spend their time making movies, their own incomprehensible versions of Coppola and Herzog cult classics.

Until Greg’s mother forces him to rekindle his childhood friendship with Rachel.

Rachel has been diagnosed with leukemia—-cue extreme adolescent awkwardness—-but a parental mandate has been issued and must be obeyed. When Rachel stops treatment, Greg and Earl decide the thing to do is to make a film for her, which turns into the Worst Film Ever Made and becomes a turning point in each of their lives.

And all at once Greg must abandon invisibility and stand in the spotlight.

About this title

About the Author

Jesse Andrews is a writer, musician, and former German youth hostel receptionist. He is a graduate of Harvard University and lives in Brooklyn, New York, which is almost as good as Pittsburgh. His debut novel Me and Earl and the Dying Girl is now an award-winning film. He is currently directing his first feature-length film, inspired by David Foster Wallace's essay A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again. Visit him online at www.jesseandrews.com

From Kirkus Reviews

A frequently hysterical confessional from a teen narrator who won't be able to convince readers he's as unlikable as he wants them to believe.

"I have no idea how to write this stupid book," narrator Greg begins. Without answering the obvious question—just why is he writing" this stupid book"?—Greg lets readers in on plenty else. His filmmaking ambitions. His unlikely friendship with the unfortunately short, chain-smoking, foulmouthed, African-American Earl of the title. And his unlikelier friendship with Rachel, the titular "dying girl." Punctuating his aggressively self-hating account with film scripts and digressions, he chronicles his senior year, in which his mother guilt-trips him into hanging out with Rachel, who has acute myelogenous leukemia. Almost professionally socially awkward, Greg navigates his unwanted relationship with Rachel by showing her the films he's made with Earl, an oeuvre begun in fifth grade with their remake of Aguirre, Wrath of God. Greg's uber-snarky narration is self-conscious in the extreme, resulting in lines like, "This entire paragraph is a moron." Debut novelist Andrews succeeds brilliantly in painting a portrait of a kid whose responses to emotional duress are entirely believable and sympathetic, however fiercely he professes his essential crappiness as a human being.

Though this novel begs inevitable thematic comparisons to John Green's The Fault in Our Stars (2011), it stands on its own in inventiveness, humor and heart.

Edition details

• Publisher: Allen & Unwin
• Publication date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1760290440
• ISBN 13: 9781760290443
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 308