The Fault on Our Stars
By John Green
Dutton Books, 2012
The Fault in Our Stars is a young adult novel about teenagers dying of cancer. If this sounds grim, well, sometimes it is. However, it is also often funny, interesting, intelligent, and touching.
Hazel has some serious cancer going on, although it is currently in remission. Aside from being tethered to an oxygen tank and feeling pretty crappy most of the time, she's doing okay. She still goes, against her will, to a cancer support group in the basement of her local church. It is made bearable by a quietly snarky boy, Isaac, who has a rare form of eye cancer, and who shares Hazel's low views of the whole enterprise. Better, it turns out he has a handsome friend, Augustus, who, despite being really very cute, apparently cancer free, and quite interesting, also likes Hazel quite a bit.
There's a lot going on, including dire cancerful things, lots of smart teenagers talking about books and metaphors and philosophy, mostly in highly cynical terms, and the whole problem of dealing with your family when you all know you won't be around for that much longer. But the central MacGuffin is the reclusive author of Hazel's favorite book, An Imperial Affliction -- a rather literary work of a young girl dying of cancer. Hazel has tried and failed to contact the author multiple times, but Augustus manages to track him down, and a wish from the Make a Wish Foundation The Genie Foundation allows them to travel to Amsterdam to meet him.
This is very much akin to Green's earlier novels, although perhaps more polished, and if you have read and enjoyed any of his books you will almost surely enjoy this one -- even if the whole 'dying of cancer' seems a bit off-putting. Even though cancer has clearly, irrevocably taken over the main character's lives, they are still teenagers first and foremost, and fairly intelligent and witty ones at that. I personally liked (once I got used to the idea), that Green's trademark borderline mentally unstable teens have, in this case, an immediately obvious reason for their mental issues, making them a bit easier to identify with.
If you have not yet read any of Green's novels, this is an excellent place to start. It is well-written and easy to get into, and his writing style and his characters do an amazing job of keeping the story entertaining and engaging, and not too very depressing. It is also, as it happens, a great book for any teenager you might happen to know.
ISBN-10: 0525478817
ISBN-13: 978-0525478812
Accelerated Reader: Level 5.5