The Fault In Our Stars was published in 2012 by John Green and is a Penguin Group USA novel. It is realistic fiction and a reasonable length of 318 pages. This book kept me turning pages and reading into all hours of the night. The Fault in Our Stars follows a 16-year-old girl who is living life with thyroid cancer. This girl is constantly aware of the fact that death is never too far behind her.Then, she meets a boy who is recovering from osteosarcoma and they fall in love. Join Hazel and Gus on the rollercoaster of living with cancer in The Fault In Our Stars a wonderful, tragic, yet captivating book.

The Fault In Our Stars is narrated by Hazel Grace, an only child who is always thinking about how she affects others. Hazel can’t help but drudge through life because she is suffering from thyroid cancer. One of her goals before she dies is to make sure she distances herself from others, so she doesn’t hurt many people when her cancer finally takes over. Then there is Gus, your average teenage boy who loves video games and girls. Gus is fun-loving, a huge jokester, and constantly talks in metaphor. Gus is also different, he suffered from osteosarcoma and is missing his right leg because of it. Both characters are likable and relatable. Many teenagers experience angst, relationships, and heartbreak just like Hazel and Gus.

Hazel and Gus live in Indianapolis, the 137th nicest city in America, and could be any kids you see today in a cancer support group. One of the best described places in this book is the support group where Hazel and Gus meet. Their group meets right in the middle of a cross shaped church where Jesus’ heart would be. The support group is overwhelmingly boring and the only friend Hazel has there is Isaac who is also friends with Gus. The setting and the plot are not integral. This story could happen anyway where in the United States and it wouldn’t affect the plot in anyway. The hometown of Hazel and Gus seems fairly similar to Milwaukee; both are boring and not particularly special.

“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 free time to thinking about death.” So, with that Hazel is forced to go to cancer support group and listen to Patrick, her group leader, talk about his lack of balls. However, when Hazel arrives at support group she notices a new, mysterious, and attractive guy watching her. Hazel meets this attractive boy, Gus, and he promptly tells her she is beautiful and invites her over to watch V for Vendetta. Well, after a while Gus and Hazel really start to like each other and Hazel makes Gus read An Imperial Affliction, her favorite book. Gus loves the book and insists that Hazel and he take a trip to Amsterdam to visit the author. Just as things are going well and Hazel and Gus think they will in fact be heading for Amsterdam, Hazel gets sick. After a week in the hospital, Hazel recovers and she travels to Amsterdam with Gus. Soon after arriving in Amsterdam they visit the author of An Imperial Affliction, but he is not feeling so well so they promptly leave. Hazel and Gus return home and one of them is shocked with the news of the others condition. As they struggle through together the book end with the parting of the two and the words “I do.”

There are many themes in this book, but the most prominent theme is “Live every moment like it’s your last.” One of the ways this is expressed in the book is when Hazel and Gus are in Amsterdam and everything is finally going perfectly disaster strikes. Some of the universal themes are death, love, life, and time. From this story I learned the importance of expressing everything when you feel it and that you never have as much time as you think you do. I love the writing style of this book. I think the author captures this serious subject perfectly and clearly understand what it is like to be looked in the eyes by death. This book, like others by John Green, is very serious, but has a humorous aspect as well.

I absolutely loved this book. Although the book made me cry it was one of the best books I have ever read. The book was well written and thought out and the characters are relatable. I have no objections to the book and found it to be flawless. However, it was slightly unrealistic because the chances of a cancer like osteosarcoma returning are about 15%. The story had so many twists and turns I could never tell what was coming next and the ending was definitely surprising. I would definitely recommend this book to a friend, but I would say it is for young adults because there is some foul language and other adult content. I think the author succeeded in creating a book that was both enjoyable and to the point. Overall, I found The Fault In Our Stars riveting.