Paper Towns

Quentin "Q" Jacobsen has spent his whole life a few doors down from Margo Roth Spiegelman, the magnetic, legend-making girl he has quietly loved since childhood. Then one night Margo climbs through his window and recruits him for an all-night campaign of elaborate revenge across their Orlando suburb — and by morning she has vanished.

Margo has disappeared before, but this time she has left a trail of cryptic clues that seem meant for Q. Convinced he is the one person who can find her, Q and his friends chase the breadcrumbs through abandoned "paper towns," fake map entries, and the gap between the girl Margo actually is and the mystery he has built her into.

A coming-of-age road novel about idealization, identity, and really seeing other people, Paper Towns is one of John Green's most beloved books and the basis for the 2015 film. It is funny and wistful in equal measure, and quietly skeptical of the manic-pixie-dream-girl fantasy it appears to indulge.