In 2014, TIME magazine recognized John Green, along with 99
others, as being one of the most influential people in the world.
One of Green’s creations that certainly helped thrust him to
this spotlight was a poignant love story rolling through the ups and downs of
life for two teenagers with cancer.
Published in 2012, “The Fault in Our Stars” was the fourth
novel solely written by John Green.
In the story, Hazel Grace and Augustus Waters meet at a
support group, and quickly grow close to each other. Hazel’s thyroid cancer has
crept to her lungs, while Augustus has been robbed of a leg by osteosarcoma.
Though not without humor, this story is full of heartbreak. The
main characters are relatable, as we watch Hazel fall in love with Augustus while
continuing to struggle with her disease. As with Augustus’ character, the reality
is that sometimes people don’t stay strong. An article from The New York Times
states, “Over the course of the narrative, his appealing exterior breaks down;
his flaws, fears and humiliations are exposed, yet he is all the more lovable
for his frailty and heartbreaking humanity.”
John Green once said “all good American literature is always
interested in people who are ambiguously heroic,” and that’s how he constructed
these characters.
“’The Fault in Our Stars’ is all the more heart-rending for
its bluntness about the medical realities of cancer. There are harrowing
descriptions of pain, shame, anger and bodily fluids of every type. It is a
narrative without rainbows or flamingoes; there are no magical summer snowstorms.
Instead, Hazel has to lug a portable oxygen tank with her wherever she goes,
and Gus has a prosthetic leg. Their friend Isaac is missing an eye and later
goes blind. These unpleasant details do nothing to diminish the romance; in
Green’s hands, they only make it more moving. He shows us true love — two
teenagers helping and accepting each other through the most humiliating
physical and emotional ordeals — and it is far more romantic than any sunset on
the beach.”
When asked in an interview for
Goodreads what
his inspiration was for the book, Green described meeting a young girl with
thyroid cancer named Esther in 2009. The impact she made on him motivated the novel.
“I knew I wanted to write a story about sick kids, but I was
so angry, so furious with the world that these terrible things could happen,
and they weren't even rare or uncommon, and I think in the end for the first
ten years or so I never could write it because I was just too angry, and I
wasn't able to capture the complexity of the world. I wanted the book to be
funny. I wanted the book to be unsentimental. After meeting Esther, I felt very
differently about whether a short life could be a rich life.”
In
The New
Yorker, it states: “Most Y.A. readers are girls, but because Green is male
and his first books featured boys as protagonists his new novel seemed capable
of reaching both genders. “Stars” is a love story, but Strauss-Gabel
successfully pushed for a cover that did not look like a traditional Y.A.
romance: no pink, no photograph of a pretty girl. Instead, the title dominates,
and the background is blue.”
From this, we can derive that there is no logical reason why
any respectable reader would carry this manuscript around feeling anything less
than proud.
In an article about John Green previously mentioned from
TIME magazine, it
says “Some say that through his books, John gives a voice to teenagers. I
humbly disagree. I think John hears the voices of teenagers. He acknowledges
the intelligence and vulnerability that stem from those beautiful years when we
are, for the first time, discovering the world and ourselves outside of our
familial stories.”
That is what makes stories like “The Fault in Our Stars” so
powerful.
Other works of John Green include the books “Looking for
Alaska,” “Paper Towns,” and “An Abundance of Katherines.” This talented man is
not just a novelist, however. He became popular on the YouTube channel that he
and his brother (
Hank Green) started in 2007 called
VlogBrothers.
Together, they have also generated instructive episodes covering sciences,
literature and history which they call
Crash Course.
A quote near the beginning of “The Fault in Our Stars” declares,
“Sometimes, you read a book and it fills you with this weird evangelical zeal,
and you become convinced that the shattered world will never be put back
together unless and until all living humans read the book.”
“The Fault in Our Stars” is one of those books.
At a Glance:
Grade for book: A+
