Hank Green has always been the science-oriented brother in the famous Vlog Brothers YouTube channel, while his brother John Green was best known as the novelist. However, that’s a title they’ll both have to share as Hank Green has announced that his debut novel, An Absolutely Remarkable Thing will be coming out next year.
Here’s the plot synopsis, thanks to The New York Times:
[The novel is about] an art student in New York City named April May, who finds herself at the center of a vast international mystery. One day, April stumbles on a giant robot sculpture in Midtown Manhattan, and makes a video with the figure, which goes viral. She becomes famous as news spreads that similar sculptures have mysteriously appeared in dozens of cities, and people around the world struggle to understand where the figures came from and what they mean.
The novel, Green says, is based on his experiences dealing with Internet fame, with some sci-fi and mystery elements mixed in for good measure. Green expressed nerves about having the book published and, reportedly, has not even shown his brother a draft of the book yet.
Now, something interesting I found while doing a search for news about the novel was stumbling onto this Patron page, which is https://www.patreon.com/AprilMay. The author is Hank Green, who released chapters of a story during 2015, and the icon is for a giant robot, so it’s pretty clear it’s legit. Are the chapters going to look anything like the finished novel? Only donors will know for sure, though it might be wise for someone at Dutton, the company publishing the book, or Green himself to take it down now that it is officially going to press.
An Absolutely Remarkable Thing hits bookstore shelves in the fall of 2018.