Book Review: Finding no faults in….The Fault in Our Stars

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

Recently, I read The Fault in Our Stars by John Green.  I didn’t even read the jacket, so I had no idea what I was getting myself into.   Do you ever do that? Truthfully, the cover is so eye catching I probably would have picked it up anyway though.  Don’t you just love that vibrant blue?  This was another internet find, see.  Pinterest or Tumblr…(I can’t remember which now) introduced me to this author.  He and his brother Hank Green have a YouTube channel, VlogBrothers and someone made a meme about “the Venn diagram of boys who are stupid and boys you don’t want to date is a circle”.  Here is the link to the whole video.

I loved it, and I completely agree! Down the rabbit hole I went trying to find out more about this guy.  Not only do they have the VlogBrothers, there’s the Nerdfighters and all this other stuff too.  Here’s a video explaining How to Be A Nerdfighter: A VlogBrothers FAQ.

Somewhere along the way I became distracted. (You know the dog in the movie Up? Some days my friends say I’m a bit….Squirrel!) There was a comment I read about this amazing book The Fault in Our Stars. Whoa, this guy’s a writer? Then I got distracted by something shiny.

I put the book on my to-buy list.  That was not the last mention of The Fault in Our Stars I would come across.  Everyone has a list of books to pick up next time they’re out, right?  Like a grocery list, but to feed the mind.  After a girls night dinner, I got conned into going to the book store.  Okay, fine, she didn’t so much con me as mention she was going to the book store and I may have begged to go along….just a little bit.  She picked up a book to read on her vacation and I got The Fault in Our Stars.  This did not sit in my to-read pile for long.  It was like the bright blue cover was calling to me, so  I took it with me to start while I visited my best friend for her birthday.

I owe my best friend a HUGE apology.  It should probably involve wine and possibly cake to convince her to forgive me.  See, here is the problem.  It was her birthday. (The problem was not her birthday, we are NOT that old!  The problem was me.) The book came with me when I visited for her birthday.  There may have been an entire evening…fine it was the whole night,  that I was engrossed with this story.  This was NOT THE PLAN.  It was very nearly physically impossible to put down.  Every time I tried, I got pulled back in again. (Just one more chapter…) The day began just fine.  I started reading just before breakfast, and I did manage to put the book down to cook the birthday breakfast of pancakes. (I make some killer pancakes!)  We ran around town, did fun things, and got some sushi for dinner.  Then after dinner, I picked it up to read a chapter or two while we watched a movie I’d already seen…and I finished it at 12:30 am.  No conversation, nothing, just reading, maybe a few exclamations or bits of laughter.  Fine, my eyes may have gotten a bit misty once or twice, definitely nothing interactive…with my best friend…for her birthday.  (She definitely deserves wine and cake.)

These characters….I mean, wow, they’re great, so well written, and REAL.  I just loved Hazel to pieces! Don’t even get me started on Augustus or Isaac.  They broke my heart and mended it all at once.  Hazel is so…. It is like trying to describe your best friend or your sister.  Every time I think of her, I get a clear picture of her as a person, but feel I lack the ability to accurately describe her.  Even if I tried, I couldn’t do her justice.  I would surely leave out a vital piece of her.  You simply must meet Hazel.    These are teenagers that are funny, sarcastic and irreverent.  They have the same tone that I hear when my 15-year-old niece speaks (the one that makes me want to laugh and roll my eyes all at once), and they are intelligent, fiercely intelligent.  It is all tempered with this maturity and an awareness of others that is far beyond their years, which is completely understandable due to the circumstances. Their stories are told with truth, humor and grace.

Although this is classified as a young adult book, don’t let that deter you from picking it up (or putting it on your book shopping list…like literary groceries!).  It tackles some tough subjects, and it meets them head-on. These heavy-hitters are all handled honestly and with care. Don’t let the tough subjects steer you away from this book either!  I’m really glad that I didn’t know anything about the book before I bought it.  Honestly, I might have delayed reading it, if I’d known in advance.  That would have been something I regretted.  I wouldn’t hesitate to hand over this book to my niece. (Convincing her to read more than her Twitter feed is something else though.)  She’d enjoy it and come out the other side changed…for the better.  I know I did.  That is the mark of a really good book, after all.  The Fault in Our Stars is definitely an amazing book, and I plan on reading it again  . . . soon.  There are some nooks, crannies and layers yet to explore here. (I did read it in less than 24 hours after all.)

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 in bed, read the same book over and over, ate infrequently, and devoted quite a bit of my abundant free time to thinking about death.”

‘Til next time!
Love,

Jessica