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| Ansel Elgort as Gus and Shailene Woodley as Hazel shoot in Amsterdam for The Fault In Our Stars |
This particular book was a suggestion from a classmate. She is an avid reader like me, and one incredible day she recommended this book to my friend Adrija and me. I finished reading The Fault In Our Stars (TFIOS) in exactly six hours. It’s one of those books (and the only book) that doesn’t have a twisted plot and a race against time, but will keep one engrossed throughout, and not only once, but time and again.
I’m gonna use very simple language and simple words to write about this beautiful book by THE John Green. The plot revolves around 16-year-old Hazel Grace Lancaster and 17-year-old Augustus Waters. Hazel was diagnosed with lung cancer at age 13 and has been homeschooled since. Augustus lost a leg through osteosarcoma and has a prosthetic leg. He goes to university and used to be a star basketball player. Shy at first, they become lovers by the end. Both of them being extremely intellectual and Augustus being a fan of metaphors, it’s their conversations that make the book more than just a book.
Augustus “Gus” Waters uses his dying wish to take Hazel to meet her favourite author in Amsterdam, giving her a “forever within her numbered days”. On returning home, Augustus tells Hazel he’s about to die.
For the rest of the quotes and emotions and sudden bursts of humour, you ought to read the book. After the book is over, every girl will be left wondering where her Augustus is.
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There’s nothing I don’t love about this book — the characters, their emotional attachment with others and the chemistry between Gus and Hazel. Then there’s this epilogue. It’s an eulogy that Augustus leaves for Hazel, and the whole point of reading the book is to get to the eulogy and understand the depth with which it is written. My favourite book used to be Anne of Avonlea, which is the second part of Anne of Green Gables. No book I’ve read since then could take its position. But The Fault In Our Stars did. This book teaches us a lot. It teaches us that pain demands to be felt. It teaches us that we’re all a grenade and one day we’ll all explode, injuring the ones around us. It teaches us that some infinites are bigger than other infinites. It teaches us to love our choices.
The film adaptation has gotten me really excited, and I can’t wait to watch it. For the first time, the cast of the film totally matches the characters of the book. Ansel Elgort’s smile is similar to Augustus’s; the way I imagined Gus talking is the way Ansel talks. The filmmakers couldn’t have found a better actor to play Gus Waters. Ansel is just too cute. I think he is the sixth cutest guy after all the members of One Direction.
And one last thing. Just the way Hazel wanted to meet Peter Van Houten, I want to meet John Green.
The Fault in Our Stars is about a girl called Hazel Grace Lancaster from Indianapolis. She contracts lung cancer at the age of 13. When she’s supposed to be in school like everyone else, she has to go to hospital for medication and surgery. By the time she’s 16 and homeschooled into college, the “cancer kid” side of Hazel completely takes over her personality. She doesn’t fear death, she’s just tired of pretending that she’s not tempted to leave all of this behind. Judging from her behaviour, her mother assumes she is depressed and sends her to a support group in the basement of a church.
One day a dishy young man named Augustus Waters turns up at the support group and Hazel can’t help but notice. He stares at her endlessly. She reciprocates. And before you know it they are the teens-so-in-love. She finds herself in him, when he spouts lines like “I don’t fear death, I fear oblivion.”
Every kid with cancer gets to fulfil a wish that is funded by a company. Since Hazel spent her wish on travelling to Disneyland when she was 13, Augustus uses his wish to take her to meet her favourite author, Peter Van Houten, in Amsterdam. And magic unfolds. Augustus takes her to a restaurant for dinner. They watch the sun set in a gondola as fragrant pollen that resemble petals fall all around them. Just when their trip is about to end, he tells her he’s going to die.
For me this book is a lot more than just a book. What I love about this book? Everything! I love the way Augustus is — charming, witty, intelligent and refusing to give in to cancer. I love the way he puts a cigarette in his mouth and doesn’t light it. “It’s a metaphor, see: You put the killing thing right between your teeth, but you don’t give it the power to do its killing.” I love the way he sees Hazel — without the cannulas and without the cancer. I love the way he loves her — unconditionally.
I love Isaac, the blind guy with cancer in his eyes. I love how strong Hazel’s parents are. I love all the places Augustus takes her to. I love the inspiring quotes in the nooks and crannies of Augustus’s home. I love the way Augustus calls her “Hazel Grace”. I love the fact that they meet in “Jesus’s heart” — at the centre of a cross in the church basement. I love the way they say so much by only saying “Okay”.
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And now I have one more reason to love TFIOS — Ansel Elgort! The 20-year-old American actor is all I could’ve hoped for Augustus to be — absolutely charming. And he’s sooooo cute! He’s like a tub of chocolate, you want to dig right in! TFIOS is about a touch of cancer in all of us. It’s about a little bit of Hazel in all of us. It’s about the universe that wants to be noticed and the pain that demands to be felt.
To sum it up: “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.” — John Green, The Fault In Our Stars
