I have bought a couple of John Green's books before, Looking For Alaska and Paper Towns, and although they were very well written and thought provoking they just didn't have that page turner factor. This book shows all of his great writing skills and it was absolutely unputdownable. (I may have just made that word up.)
Whereas most similar novels would try to get their characters to be almost saint like, Green has created Hazel Lancaster as just the normal teenage girl who likes boys and watches trashy tv and oh yeah, has cancer.
I don't think I've ever actually laughed and then cried in the same paragraph before, it's just such a touching and heartbreaking story. In fact I don't even remember when I last cried to a book. It's a very hard thing to accomplish with me as I'm stone cold usually!
I remember one day when I was about 11 years old, my whole family watched a movie, City of Angels I think It was, and at the end my Dad with tears in his eyes, looked at my tear free face and shouted "YOU'RE MADE OUT OF STONE!!". (And my Dad was a tough military man!) So you kind of get an idea of the level of sadness, but I also found myself actually laughing out loud and sharing paragraphs with Andy (another Vlogbrothers fan). It's a hard story to explain without revealing too much of the story. Hazel Grace Lancaster, a young girl with cancer, meets Augustus Waters, a young hot boy with a prosthetic leg, at a cancer support group. Who knew that's where anybody could find love! The story goes through all of their emotions as they struggle to come to terms with an end. Of not being a person anymore. Despite all the tears I really enjoyed reading TFioS and has a proud place on my bookshelf (all the rubbish books I read get sent to the attic :P)
John Green fans have also been going a bit mad for this one. The Green brothers are currently on tour in America promoting the book and there's been a whole ton of praise.
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