The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

Book Jacket

Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis.  But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel's story is about to be completely rewritten.

Insightful, bold, irreverent, and raw, The Fault in Our Stars is award-winning author John Green's most ambitious and heartbreaking work yet, brilliantly exploring the funny, thrilling, and tragic business of being alive and in love.

Review

In The Fault in Our Stars, John Green taught me that there are books that you want to shout about from the rooftops, demanding that the whole world be made aware of its brilliance.  There are other books that you love too intensely, that you can't bear to share for fear that sharing it will break the spell it has on you.

This is both.  I want everyone to experience the haunting beauty and hilarious tragedy that is Hazel's story.  But it's hard to talk about why I love it so much.  This a book that, within ten pages, had crept inside my heart.  It's a story about a girl with cancer.  It's a story about a girl falling in love with a boy.

But it's so much more.  The Fault in Our Stars is a philosophical book.  It says that even though the world often deals us sucky hands, there is also beauty in the pain.  The pain does not make the beauty any deeper or more meaningful, but neither does the pain wash the beauty away.  Hazel and Gus are two kids who have had to grow up way too fast by staring their own deaths in the ever-nearing face.  They feel panic and joy, and they fear for how their tragedy is affecting the people they love.  But they don't let fear of the future cloud their present, not too much.

I loved watching Hazel and Augustus fall in love.  They flirt with words, which is my favorite kind of attraction.  I loved that Hazel's parents were a huge part of her life, that although she sometimes got annoyed at their hovering, she appreciated what they sacrificed for her and loved them deeply.  I loved seeing the kids with cancer bond and joke about their pain, and I loved realizing that we are all broken in different ways, whether it's cancer or pride or fear.  But there are still friendships to enjoy, love to give yourself to, and day after day to wake up and live.

DFTBA.

Six out of five fake novels (that I want to be real) within a novel.

Release Date:  January 1012

Reading Level: Grade 8+
Where In Dunlap Public Library's Collection: YPL GRE