Text to World - Paper Towns - Isabella Martin

     Paper Towns, by John Green, is a story about an adventurous girl named Margo, who goes missing, and leaves clues for her neighbor, Quentin, to find her. Quentin recently went into Margo's room, when her parents weren't home, to find clues. He found a book of poems by Walt Whitman, and he found highlighted words in the poem, "Song of Myself." The words that Margo highlighted suggest death, such as, "I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love, / If you want me again look for me under your bootsoles." This part in the poem leads Quentin to believe that Margo may have committed suicide. He also does research on what a 'paper town' is, because that is what Margo called Orlando. He found that a paper town could also mean a 'pseudovision,' meaning an abandoned subdivision because they didn't have enough funding to finish building. He searches every abandoned subdivision within three miles of Orlando, and visits them. Quentin asked his and Margo's friends  for clues that could help him find her. He skips prom night just to go to an abandoned strip mall, where he finds a blanket that smells like Margo, the exact same color of nail polish that she wears, and some blue spray paint on the wall.
     This story relates to the 800,000 missing children that disappear in the U.S. each year, which is about 2,000 per day. In Margo's case, because she is a legal adult, officials are in no rush to find her, because she is in charge of herself. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children calls this type of case, when a child or young adult goes missing for an unknown reason, an 'unknown case.' According to the 2009 Missing Children Reference Report, most missing child reports made to the police in 2009 were 'unknown cases.' Despite the calmness of the police, Quentin spends all of his free time trying to find his crush.
     I began to think that Margo is just playing with Quentin, seeing how far he'll go to find her, if she has even truly disappeared. She might already know that Quentin has been crushing on her since they were little, and she is just testing him. I like that Margo is an independent young woman, she stands out from everyone else, and always thinks 10 steps ahead.