Title: The Fault in Our Stars
Author: John Green
Year of Publication: 2012
Genre: Young Adult
Pages: 313
First Line: "Late in the winter of my seventeenth year, my mother decided I was depressed, presumably because I rarely left the house, spent quite a lot of time, read the same book over and over, ate infrequently, and devoted quite a bit of my abundant free time to thinking about death."
Summary: 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.
Source: Back of book.
Review:
John Green, New York Times
Bestselling Author, is never short on poignant remarks. The author, vlogger, nerdfighter*, former
children’s hospital chaplain, and sometimes-historian recently released the
young adult novel The Fault in Our Stars
with Dutton Books. After signing all
150,000 copies of the first printing of The
Fault in Our Stars (henceforth Fault),
Green’s dedication to his readers and his fan base (sometimes known as
nerdfighteria) has been proven, if there was any doubt to begin with. Fault
is an extraordinary, touching, insightful book that will, as Green expressed he
hoped, “will make you feel all of the things!”
The
first of his novels to be narrated by a female and inspired by both his time as
a chaplain and nerdfighter Esther Earl, Fault
begins in the seventeenth year of a young woman named Hazel Grace
Lancaster. Hazel, diagnosed with cancer
in her early teens, is withdrawn and, according to her mother and doctor,
depressed. As a result, she begins
attending group therapy where she meets Augustus Waters, a boy in
remission. Chronicling their time
together, Hazel tells about her friends, such as Isaac, her trip to Amsterdam,
meeting her author-idol Peter van Houten, dealing with being a “grenade,” falling
in love, and how “okay” came to mean so much more.
Like
Green’s other novels, Fault is
exceedingly clever and smart and, while catching onto inside jokes (mostly from
the nerdfighter community) or allusions certainly adds to the novel, the book
is accessible and enjoyable no matter your level of obscure knowledge, something
Green seems to enjoy packing into his stories.
This quality is especially important because it says so much about Green’s
attitude toward teens: “Teenagers are plenty smart. I don’t sit around and
worry whether teenagers are smart. I mean, most of the people currently reading
The Scarlet Letter and The Great Gatsby…are
teenagers,” Green wrote on one of his blogs, TFiOS Questions Answered, and
reminds his viewers frequently in his videos.
These jokes and
clever nods to art, history, and the like will make you laugh and then by the next
sentence, you will be crying. The honest,
insightful book both breaks and mends the heart at once, reminding the reader
of their inherent humanness. Green makes
it easy for the reader to become attached to the characters with their clever,
if sometimes slightly forgivably unrealistic, dialogue. Meanwhile, his beautifully flowing sentences
reminds the reader of the intricate and ornate phrasing of Shakespeare – his
play Julius Caesar being the title’s
inspiration – though decidedly more readable and modern.
In reading Fault, the reader not only gains a new
understanding of themselves and the world around him, but also a whole
community of other readers of the book, where Green is just another
neighbor. No matter your age, this young
adult novel will move you in a way no other novel has before, or, probably,
ever will.
Worst part: --
Best part: --
Grade: A+
Other Books by This Author: Looking for Alaska; An Abundance of Katherines; Paper Towns, Let It Snow; Will Grayson, Will Grayson
Author's Website: John Green
We'll Always Have Summer
