Summer Reading "Looking For Alaska" Entry 2

Pudge, the main character, may be seen and most of the time is simple. Most of what he says is what he means, he is not metaphorical and you understand everything he says. What makes pudge complex is the love life he lives as he loves one girl and dates another, constantly flirting with the woman he loves but dates and interacts with the woman he dates. Alaska, the woman pudge is in love with, is the most complex character I have ever been introduced to in a novel. She never once in the entire book says, thinks, or admits her love for Pudge. She flirts with him constantly, has many love scenes with Pudge, and even gets intimate with him. She says throughout the story "I love my boyfriend" who let me clarify is not Pudge. She keeps so many dark secrets to herself and her friends (Pudge, The Colonel, and Takumi) do not learn most of them except that her mothers death is her fault and her father blames her. Alaska speaks in metaphor almost 100% of the time and even develops the theme herself with her suffering which is "How do I get out of the Labyrinth" a question that gets answered by Alaska, of course, in a figure of speech. Takumi who the reader does not know until about the last page of the book, also loves Alaska. Takumi is pretty simple in that he is at Culver Creek, he is friends with the 3 others, and he goes along with every rule and prank the four of them create. The book is structured in first person in Pudges' perspective. This making understanding Alaska's metaphors and poetic speeches nonetheless more difficult. John Green gives us Pudges' thoughts and perceptions making him a more simple character because we understand everything he does. Well I am guessing everyone is dieing to know the answer or even know what the heck "How do I get out of the Labyrinth" Even means but as Alaska answers it, the Labyrinth is not life or death, but it is suffering. And a somewhat of a (SPOILER ALERT) suicide note she writes next to the question "Straight and fast". This being relevant because how she dies is in a car accident described by an officer as "She didnt swerve, and sped up directly into the stationary truck". Below is a link to a summation to "The Labyrinth" so you can better understand what the labyrinth is as Alaska created this them by pulling the quote out of another book (I know, a book inside a book, its weird).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_General_in_His_Labyrinth