Date Edition Publisher Physical Desc. Availability [] First edition. Dutton Books, pages ; 22 cm On Shelf. More Info Place Hold. Available Online. Online OverDrive Collection. Online OverDrive Collection has 6. Quick Copy View. See Full Copy Details. Check Out OverDrive. More Copies In Prospector. Loading Prospector Copies Loading Excerpt Staff View. Grouped Work ID:. G b Fau 1 4 a PS R b F38 0 0 a [Fic] 2 23 0 4 a G r F38 1. G Fau 1. G r Fau 1. She is trying to be a good daughter, friend, student, and maybe even a good detective while also living within the ever-tightening spiral of her own thoughts.
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Targeting cookies are used to make advertising messages more relevant to you and your interests. They perform functions like preventing the same content from reappearing, ensuring ads are displayed and, in some cases, selecting content based on your interests. Paperback Features Find your next read This was something I hadn't anticipated. I'd prepared myself for many different possibilities: heartbreak, a changed perspective on life and death, disdain, annoyance Hence the lower rating.
One of the first problems I encountered was that the kids were wise beyond their years. And I don't mean intelligent, I mean wise. They came out with things that really only suit people who've been alive a few centuries - like Dumbledore or Gandalf - or at the very least people who are sat comfortably in middle age. I like that Green doesn't patronise his readers by oversimplifying things or dumbing down characters in a condescending effort to appeal to teenagers, but these characters behave in a way that is unnatural to the point where sometimes it is verging on ridiculous.
It's not completely unbelievable that some kids exist who are actually like this, but they definitely don't all speak and behave in this way. The characters are all, in one way or another, John Green. They all have his quirkiness, his sense of humour; I was picturing several John Greens sat around having a conversation while I was reading The Fault in Our Stars.
In fact, reading this book was a little bit like watching one of Green's vlogs, which might have worked well if JG hadn't dampened the humour with philosophical musings. As it was, I had a book that was trying so very hard to be both funny and sad at the same time and ended up failing to deliver either one as successfully as I would have liked. The dialogue felt false and scripted because of the teens' tendency to showcase their depth and intelligence.
Natural conversation between anyone of any age doesn't work like this and I couldn't shake the feeling that there should be a laughter track playing in the background.
I believe that the exaggerated characters and their unrealistic conversations would have been fine in a straight-up humour book because that's not supposed to portray something real and deep and moving. But Green loses it by trying to be philosophical and, in the end, I think he has produced a book that is as melodramatic and message-driven as any other on this issue.
And his attempt to balance humour and sadness left me somewhat devoid of emotion throughout and provided fewer laughs than I'd hoped. Ultimately, I feel that JG sacrificed humour in order to be deep and philosophical - perhaps this book tried to be too many things, perhaps JG tried to be too clever.
Like I said near the beginning, perhaps I am just tired of these books and The Fault in Our Stars needs to be appreciated by someone who has not already exhausted themselves on similar efforts.
Blog Facebook Twitter Instagram Tumblr Oct 23, Rhi rated it it was ok Shelves: books-that-made-me-cry , ya-you-have-my-heart , , 2-stars. I must be clear from the beginning. This is perhaps the most personal review I have written. My choice of stars was difficult for this.
I am a self confessed John Green fan, I believe he is amongst the best of, not only YA, but fiction writers out there in general. This is a beautifully written book. There is very little to complain about in terms of style, plot, character, etc.
However I couldn't, in all good conscience, give this any higher because it sits so badly with me. I have let this nov I must be clear from the beginning. I have let this novel marinate for a couple of days now before writing this, and I just keep coming back to the same issues. Namely: Was this John Green's story to tell? It is the human condition to attempt to find hope in hopeless situations.
But let me attempt to explain how watching a 17 year old fade away truly feels. Because when the wit and words are stripped away I am not sure John did that. It is endless. It is an unavoidable and uncontrollable and an all encompassing darkness where no hope or life or explanations exist. There are absolutely no life lessons to be gained from watching a 17 year old cease to exist.
There is no comfort. The lessons that some may claim you can achieve through the darkest night of the soul reveal most of humanity for the selfish, narcissistic beings we are. I have come to believe there is a special kind of cruelty behind the perfectly cross stitched 'encouragement'.
Those things are for the ones left over trying to make sense of the senseless. Whilst I believe this novel acknowledges that. It tries not to, as the main protagonists claimed theirselves, set the victims of disease up as typical heroic, worldly wise characters, it still reads like a novel attempting to bring equilibrium out of disaster. The victims ultimately still are wise beyond their years. This, it seems, is an assumed side effect of a teenager coming to terms with their mortality.
They use metaphors and pretentious poetry and a sharp wit and are wholly unbelievable as real life teenagers. They are constructs of an ideal. They are the literary version of Dawson's Creek, using SAT vocabulary and existential navel gazing, whilst simultaneously slamming the typical genre for using its characters to do the same.
Having lived this first hand; once with a brother who ceases to exist at 17 and a second time with a brother who is currently 2 years NEC. I am all too familiar with the need for light hearted humour at what may feel like the most inappropriate of times. But what differs from that and attempting to write a disease ridden novel that attempts to make you laugh, is apparently personal experience.
I have the right to sit around a Christmas table laughing somewhat hysterically at nothing. My living brother has the right to crack UNO-ball jokes whenever the opportunity arises. But none of the readers of this novel who have not experienced the kind of loss depicted here have a right to laugh at any of it.
You can not claim it as your own unless it is yours, and in my mind that is what humour does. It is not appropriate for me to laugh along with eye jokes and blind jokes, because they are not my jokes.
I am merely a voyeur in another persons tragedy, I lay no claim to having the understanding of the experience necessary to allow for laughter. Again, let me make clear. I can not approach this book outside of my personal experience. Of course in reality I do not believe you have to have experienced everything to laugh at a joke. But in terms of purposefully trying to create humour in a novel that is fundamentally tragic, for an audience that is mostly YA, I struggle with. I struggle with it because the empty platitudes that are trying so hard to be subverted in this novel, are still being created.
It is still suggesting there can be lightness and humour within the terminally dark - and it is suggesting it to people who have never experienced the terminally dark. This read like a novel where the author has truly witnessed the emptiness of teenage terminal illness, and thankfully appears to have become more considerate and thoughtful for it. As opposed to erring on the side of platitudes. But it still read as a novel attempting to explain where the hope in hopeless situations are.
Perhaps because it is too raw a subject for me, or perhaps because the novel really is sentimental and gratuitous granted in a different way from the norm of this genre but this is not a book I would recommend. For sufferers, for family members of sufferers, or for well meaning people seeking to understand the hopelessness of some situations.
I would recommend it for none. Shelves: favorites. The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars But in ourselves. What am I supposed to say? How can I do this book justice? Maybe tell you all that it was perfect? The best, most heartbreaking, hilarious book that has touched me like none other? I mean, it's been said countless times, in countless reviews, and you know what?
They are absolutely, a hundred and fifty percent true. Hazel's days are numbered thanks to her crap The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars But in ourselves. Hazel's days are numbered thanks to her crap lungs.
She was able to buy a few years more, thanks to a miracle, but she isn't fooling herself. I don't think I've ever cried so much, laughed so much, just over all enjoyed a book as much as I have while reading The Fault in Our Stars.
Everything that goes on is serious, heartbreaking and eye opening but John Green does an amazing job at, literally, making you laugh out loud. Even when you're suffering. She was real and I loved her no bullshit attitude. She wasn't fooling herself, and John Green didn't make her out to be ecstatic with the world or her situation. She wasn't bitchy or depressing, but it wasn't like she was perfectly fine to sit idly and watch the time tick by.
As he read, I fell in love the way you fall asleep: slowly, and then all at once. I fell in love with everything that was… him. Well, I step down and admit defeat. Jun 28, Tatiana rated it liked it Recommends it for: fans of cancer stories and everything John Green writes.
Shelves: starred , ya , , 6 , why-the-hype. What I'd love to know is this - what makes a writer undertake the topic of cancer? So much has already been written about it, so many Lifetime movies filmed, so many tears shed. It literally has been done to death. What new did John Green have to bring to the cancer table? The way I see it, nothing. Having your terminally sick characters be ironic about their illnesses and swap cancer jokes isn't groundbreaking.
The Fault in Our Stars isn't a bad book, but it's a standard cancer book, and, sadly, a standard John Green book, with standard John Green humor and standard John Green characters speaking in the very same John Green voice. I can't help but recognize these people and this plot, I've read all of Green's novels.
I understand why so many readers would have such an emotional response to the book. Nothing will get the ladies crying quicker than a kid dying of cancer. Add in some long farewells, painkillers, eulogies and funerals - you can collect buckets of tears. But, IMO, here Green aims for the most obvious, the most easily accessible emotions, for the most typical "life lessons.
Because this, unlike his earlier works, feels commercial and intentionally tearjerky and insincere. It will probably sell the most copies. This is me after I finished the book and whenever I think about it. I'm surprised how many people are willing to read my little blurb of nothingness!
They've had to go through so much more in their lifetime than a This is me after I finished the book and whenever I think about it. They've had to go through so much more in their lifetime than a lot of teenagers will ever have to, and its aged them. If you want to, I'm just tiny words on a screen. Do whatever you want. As much of an amazing writer as I want to be I'm really not. So I'll just point out the things that made this book amazing. What I didn't expect is bawling my eyes out.
I really didn't. John Green has done an amazing job of making these characters feel so real to me. When they cried, I cried bawled. When they laughed, I laughed.
When they melted, I melted. The characters were perfection! Especially Augustus Waters. Not only is his name Augustus which is epic in itself He had the guts to go up to Hazel and just straight up ask her to come hang out with him.
Nice guys finish last? I think not. You know this book was so awesmazing that I gave it its own tag. Just look up there and you'll see a little tag that says "the-fault-in-our-stars". It was THAT amazing. So amazing that I'm pretty sure it was my first heartbreak I really haven't felt that much from a book, much less a person, in a very long time. I'm kind of a loner and a commitment phob John Green. You're not like Peter Van Houten, are you?
What have you done to my brain I'm not gonna review how exquisite John Green can write, or how he can create characters as special as Hazel Grace and Augustus Waters, or how amazing he can tell a story.
Despite the huge number of ratings and the spectacular average rating, this book is not perfect. You might find it unrealistic, because if there are many of us who see the life and its complexity like Haze John Green. You might find it unrealistic, because if there are many of us who see the life and its complexity like Hazel and Gus do, this world will be such a happy place.
So like any other book, this one also might be a miss or a hit. If it's a miss, then you can say it's not worth the hype. But if it's a hit, it hits hard. Everything in this book: the characters, the story, the words, they all have the power to be an inspiration. If you haven't read it, I suggest to take the chance. View all 88 comments. So, book, you decided not to play fair, huh?
You used Tearjerking , huh? You armed yourself with adorably precocious teenage characters delivering insanely quotable lines while dying from cancer, huh? Well, guess what - "I'm not cryyyyying! It's just been raining on my face Are you tired of reading the word 'precocious' yet? Too bad, since adorable and fragile precociousness is at the 'literal heart' of this book. That's what alienated some readers - but I'm a sucker for precociousness in literature; guilty, your Honor!
You can see it as a shameless use of a serious medical condition in children in order to make money and get recognition because it's kids dying from cancer, c'mon! Cancer in kids has been used as a tearjerker before. Here, I will save you the trouble. You can see it as a cutesy young adult love story. You can see it as a collection of quotable lines clearly put into the speech of teens by the middle-aged author. You can even see it as a book trying really hard to NOT be a stereotypical 'cancer book' - to the point where characters are stating so at length.
All these are to some extent true. But what I got out of it, what made me tear up a bit was the motif of fragility of life as seen by the children who have a limited supply of that life, basically a limited 'infinity'.
Reading it, I got a few flashbacks to Pediatric Oncology - the time in medical school when I realized that I'm not strong enough to be a pediatrician and see kids suffer and die. Hazel Lancaster and Augustus Waters are the two children with cancer. She has terminal thyroid cancer and is tethered to an oxygen tank; he falls victim to metastatic osteosarcoma before you scream 'Spoiler!
They introduce themselves in their cancer support group by stating their diagnoses - and my heart breaks a little at the thought of children learning to define themselves by their disease. Even their favorite book is the cancer book. But no, "I'm not cryyyying It relies a little too heavily on tearjerking.
Frequently, it gets to be a bit too full of itself, occasionally cringeworthy - sometimes to eye-rolling extent. But with the quotability factor and the smart precociousness still comes the real sadness and cuteness and feeling that clawed its way into my heart and made me love it despite the imperfections. Maybe I liked it because of associations and memories it brought with it rather than for its own merits - but hey, the emotions will stay with me for a while, whatever the reason for them may be.
I think this book would have a huge appeal to teenagers, its intended audience. The characters are relatable, they are intelligent, and the male lead manages to transform from 'oh, rly, jerk? The parents are present in the lives of both teens and are portrayed in a very sympathetic light; definitely no 'absent parent syndrome' here! Plus, it has a healthy portrayal of teenage sexuality, unlike what we frequently see in young adult literature.
So great book? But I easily give it 3. Go figure. It felt like losing your co-rememberer meant losing the memory itself, as if the things we'd done were less real and important than they had been hours before. View all 43 comments. Jul 07, emma rated it did not like it Shelves: unpopular-opinion , contemporary , ya , nope , project-review-everything , reviewed , 1-star. My sister and I actually have a running joke where we just quote this book back and forth to each other.
Although honestly anytime anyone says "It's a metaphor," I immediately say "ya put tha killin' thing between ya teeth but ya don't give it the power to do its killin'! It gets a laugh every time. Or at least a sound of disg This is the John Green-i-est book of all John Green books, and I hate it and him more than anything.
Or at least a sound of disgust, which is just as satisfying within this context. There are just so many laughable quotes. I enjoy looking at beautiful people, and I decided a while ago not to deny myself the simpler pleasures of existence.
This will ensure that they know you love them, but also prevent them from ever wanting to talk to you ever again. Oh, and: "My thoughts are stars I cannot fathom into constellations.
And how could I almost forget the classics: "Maybe 'okay' could be our 'always. I still mess up the killing thing between your teeth quote, and I say that one at least weekly. It's comedy gold because this crap is cringe-worth-i-ly affected and pretentious and unrealistic, but also focuses on basic key words and concepts you can latch onto and bring up in pretty much any given conversation. Yes, all of my friends do hate me. Why do you ask? I am just about full to bursting and sick to death of John Green's quasi-profound books and boring guys and manic girls and token diverse background characters with one quirk and not much else.
I don't know how much more pretentious dialogue and profound ponderings and fake teenage angst I can take. Perhaps unsurprisingly,t his is not so much of a mini review, but I feel like I've had a buildup of John Green-directed anger of late. Don't get me wrong, I'm constantly boiling in it, just due to who I am as a person, but his return to writing and that ugly cover reveal are making me even madder.
Can you tell that I somewhat irrationally believe he knows that I hate him? I've been so outspoken about it. Granted, over half of that outright opposition took place in my junior year AP World History class, but still.
The man could have eyes everywhere. Why, you may ask, do I continue to scream about him if I'm so scared he and his cringey YouTube videos and rabid fans will come for my life? Because he is horrible. I enjoy ranting about horrible people, and I decided a while ago not to deny myself the simpler pleasures of existence. This is part of a project I am doing wherein I write mini reviews of books I read a long time ago.
Yes, I am aware that this doesn't exactly fit anyone's definition of a mini review. View all 91 comments. Jan 10, shady boots added it. Hang on a sec.
I'm gonna leave the rating blank now, cause I feel like I wouldn't have given this book five stars had I read it today. Yeah, it definitely impacted me once upon a time, but now I've read so many unbelievably emotional books that this one just seems to, quite frankly, fade into the background.
I've read a handful of eye-opening reviews and analyses that have made me see this book in a new light. A dimmer light, sadly. Sorry to disappoint the people who liked my former review, whe Hang on a sec. Sorry to disappoint the people who liked my former review, where I claimed that this book was so "heart-destroying" and whatnot.
That was my younger self being overly dramatic, I think. View all 18 comments. May 08, Stacy rated it did not like it Shelves: library-book , read-in I had never read a John Green novel prior to reading this one.
I wanted very much to like it and felt certain after reading some of the overwhelmingly positive reviews here that it would be an awesome and heartbreaking experience. I was ready and excited. I guess I could sum the experience up best by stating that it is unlikely I will read another book by this author, and if I do it will be sometime in the future when I forget how utterly disappointing I found this book to be.
I had a lot of pro I had never read a John Green novel prior to reading this one. I had a lot of problems with this book. Overall, it felt very insincere and I was constantly distracted by how obviously everything was written with the goal of tugging on the reader's heart strings, rather than just letting things happen that were beautiful in spite of being sad.
It felt like Mr. Instead everything feels very unnatural and self-conscious in the worst way. The biggest and most impossible thing for me to get around was I simply didn't believe the character of Augustus or his relationship with main character Hazel.
As these concepts are basically what the entire story hinges upon, I didn't believe in or care about anything else that happened either. Augustus came off completely pretentious and obnoxious, particularly in the way he insisted on speaking in a Diablo Cody nerd hipster sort of dialect that no one would ever use in the real world. Some commenters here have said it's the way Mr. Green himself talks which, a. His entire character felt contrived and I never once felt a connection with him.
His whole fascination with ultimately meaningless metaphors felt condescending, like Mr. Augustus' one fault was sickness, but it was nothing that he could control. And that's just so But it wasn't just Augustus. The character of Hazel was somewhat likable, despite Mr. Green's insistance on making her 'sound like a teenager' by formating every other statement she makes like it's a question?
There was never any real reason for them to fall in love with one another, and that is crossing dangerously close into Twilight territory. He was so convienient, so effortless for Hazel. I had to wonder, was it him or was it because he was there and ready and willing? It all fell flat and left so many places to take the stories and facets of their characters completely unexplored. Ultimately, it felt completely fake. I finished it, which is the only reason I gave it 2 stars, but it was a true task.
Truthfully, it pissed me off. I would have loved to love this book as much as everyone else and have a new favorite to hold dear to my heart. Now I'm just confused. With his brother, Hank, John is one half of the Vlogbrothers youtube. You can join the millions who follow John on Twitter realjohngreen and tumblr fishingboatproceeds. John lives with his family in Indianapolis, Indiana.
Rating details. Our customer reviews Chrissy's 5-star review Did I enjoy this book: This is one of those books that I have been wanting to read for quite some time.
I am so glad that I took the time to read it. It was unexpected. This book was as good as everyone had said. It lived up to the hype. They were real, bitter, upset, trying to fight. I enjoyed that. It made me connect because it seemed more true. I rooted for them throughout the book.
I was rooting that they got the chance to live life. As I was reading, I did something that I hardly ever—more like never—do, I skipped ahead. I read parts and found out what was going to happen. Not that you can ever truly be prepared for death and dying. I just needed to know ahead of time. When the final Harry Potter book was released, I avoided the news, internet, people, etc.
I like to be surprised by books. I like to find out the story as it unfolds. I had to know. It is romantic; it is sweet. There were a lot of wonderful laugh out loud moments. I would think that when you are going through something like this, you would need to find something humorous.
Something to make you laugh. That cracked me up. The egging was hysterical, especially when the mother came out of the house. These are the words that sum up The Fault In Our Stars for me: real, funny, sad, thoughtful, sweet, romantic, angry, tragic. This is a book that I will probably read again.
Would I recommend it: Yes. Belinda's 5-star review Did I enjoy this book: Yes. Amazon recommended it to me based on my reading choices. It looked interesting so I bought it. The Fault In Our Stars is a beautiful and poignant story of teens battling cancer. Green takes you on the journey with Hazel and Gus. Fortunately for us, they made a strong impression for the short time we spend with them. I like my choices.
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