Today’s column is canceled. Which I’m sure must be weird for you considering you’re currently reading a column. Today. On this site. Yet, here I am telling you that today’s column is canceled. It’s a paradox, I know, but that doesn’t stop the fact that today’s column is canceled. In fact, this isn’t even today’s column. Honestly. I’m not messing with you Geeklings. This isn’t today’s column, because today’s column is canceled. What you’re reading is more of a column that was floating around the nexus of the universe but just so happened to come out today. I’m sure it could have come out any day, but not really as it’s very specific to today’s events, yet here we are. 

Confused yet? 

Allow me to explain. The column that you are currently reading (today) wasn’t meant to be published today. In fact, there was an entirely different column set for today that I had started writing in my mind yesterday, and some while I was in the shower this morning, that you aren’t reading. Mostly because that column got canceled. Follow me? That column might be published on another day, which is quite possible, but not today. Hence the column that you are currently reading. 

This all begs the question, why did today’s column get canceled? That explanation is far easier… book emotions. Plain and simple. I am far too overcome with a mix of intense feels from the book that I just read that there’s no way that I could do today’s column any justice. I’m just not in the mindset. All I can think about is the book… All. I. Can. Think. About.

What book was this you ask? Well, it’s Hank Green’s An Absolutely Remarkable Thing. It was the first book of my 2020 Reading Challenge (here we go fifty-two) and I fear that it set the bar far too high. It’s January 9th and I’m already worried that no other book I read this year is going to match An Absolutely Remarkable Thing… until the sequel is released in July. I love this book. I love this book so much. It’s all I’ve been thinking about for the last week. All I’ve wanted to do in my free time is read it. I’m actually retrospectively mad at myself for not finding time over the weekend to read it. I was sad that the book was ending fifty pages before it was actually over. It’s because of this book that I can’t write today’s column. 

This isn’t even a column that’s going to turn into a book review. I currently don’t know how to process my emotions into coherent thoughts. Everything would just fall out of my brain to this screen as a jumbled mess that would readsomethinglikethisbecauseIcan’tthinkorprocesslikeanormalperson. Like I want to climb to the roof of my apartment building, that sits on main street of town, and shout at the passing cars to read this book. Until I grow too cold and my irrational fear of heights kicks in. In which case, the fire department will probably have to be called to get me down like some sort of over adventurous kitten.

Instead, I’ve come here to cancel a column and not write a review. Yet, somehow that’s the most ringing endorsement I could give. An Absolutely Remarkable Thing– a book so good that it cancels all your other thoughts and prevents you from creating a coherent review because you’re too busy gushing like a schoolgirl. That doesn’t mean I’m not going to leave you with nothing though. I just neeeeeeeed to talk about this book. So here’s what I’ll leave you with.

• Know as little as possible about the plot. Seriously. I barely remember reading the blurb and kind of just dove right in. If you really feel compelled then just read the first paragraph of the book or first sentence or two of the blurb. Let this book unfold with each page turn. It’s whimsical. It’s addictive. And it’s nothing I expected. The journey is magical and the less you can mentally prep for that magic the better.
• It’s funny and charming but just because it’s funny and charming doesn’t mean that there aren’t some serious messages here. Hank Green laces this book with a ton of really insightful thoughts on socially relevant issues. I’m not saying more because see above but this book is more than the bonkers aspects of the story. And that makes it important.
• Green’s writing/voice of the narrator (I won’t even give you character names!) is perfect and inviting. As the book goes on it’s like returning to an old friend that you want to just keep hanging out with because you get them. There’s real vulnerability here. There are real emotions. When the book ended, I wanted to turn back to page one and start all over again because I missed my friends. Instead, I canceled a column and wrote this non-review review.
• In a story with a plot where unexpected and slightly unrealistic things occur there is certainly a realness to be found in An Absolutely Remarkable Thing. I admired that and it helped ground the book in reality even when things get crazy.
• There’s going to be a sequel so don’t freak out (this is more for me than it is for you).
• The book is quirky. It’s flirty. It’s charming. It’s addictive. And was exactly the book I needed right now. Who knows, maybe you need it too and you don’t even know it.

I’m sorry that I had to cancel today’s column but some things are just too powerful to ignore. Like the all-encompassing love for a story and how you just want to continue to live in that world. An all-encompassing love that prevents you from focusing on your actual tasks for the day. A story that you just want to share with everyone because you know it’s that good and you need to discuss with other people. Immediately. So please, please, please read it. Then let’s talk. I’m dying here. 

Column regularity should return tomorrow… maybe.