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The Fault in Our Stars is one of the more recent novels by author John Green. I’ve heard great things about Green since 2005 when his first novel, Looking for Alaska, came out. However, I never really took the time to stop what I was doing to read it because I was only 10 and that wasn’t something I was about back then. Now nine years later I’ve read my first John Green novel, The Fault in Our Stars, and have vowed to read all of the books he’s written. He has a witty, sarcastic style of writing that really captured my attention from the moment I started reading TFIOS.

The main character Hazel Grace Lancaster suffers from cancer and suffers through her cancer support group. She is tethered to an oxygen tank because her lungs are “sucky” lungs. Out of the group she has one person she can tolerate. Isaac had a tumor in his eye which resulted in having it removed and replaced with a false eye. Now he wears glasses that magnify his eyes to shocking extremes. Pretty much, Hazel is getting “pretty fed up with this whole cancer thing she has going on.”

All things change when she meets the highly attractive Augustus Waters at the cancer support group. He creepily stares at her throughout the entire meeting and when it’s over he tells her she is beautiful and reminds him of Natalie Portman from V for Vendetta. After knowing Hazel for an hour he invites her over to his house to watch V for Vendetta and she is rather freaked out because “he could be an axe murderer.” He wins her over and she goes over to watch the movie.

The two hit it off and when they share a mutual love for the fictional book An Imperial Affliction by Peter Van Houten. When Augustus learns that Hazel used her Wish, granted to her The Genies( a Make-A-Wish organization), to go to Disney Land and knows she wants to go meet Peter Van Houten he offers her his Wish so they could go to Amsterdam together. The two go, with Hazel’s mom tagging along, and enjoy the sights and sounds of the city. All goes well until they actually meet Van Houten, and he turns out be an arrogant, fat man who refuses to give out any information to the ending of An Imperial Affliction. On their last night in Amsterdam Augustus reveals that his body is riddled with cancer. He tells her that after his scans were done he was “lit up like a Christmas tree.” She refuses to abandon him until the very end. At the end when she reads the final letter Augustus ever wrote to Van Houten she realizes that all he wanted for her was to like the choices she made. “I do, Augustus. I do.”

Now, let’s talk about Augustus. He is one of the most lovable characters in the book, aside from Isaac who you’ve just got to like. He was the perfect match for Hazel. He took everything she said and always had some obscure response that she would enjoy. His death is one of the most devastating literary deaths I’ve ever encountered. The interactions between Hazel and Augustus as he slowly deteriorates really capture the emotion of two young people who know they are going to die eventually, but they don’t allow that to change their feelings for each other. They really try to overcome the odds that have been placed against them.

If you’ve never read a John Green novel, TFIOS is the one to start off with. It’s really one of the most emotional, humorous, and captivating books about young adults suffering from cancer, rivaling My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult.