I read this in 12 hours and I would have read it quicker if I hadn’t stopped to write some things down and google Conor Clapton and eat etc…
A lot of people told me to read this book, that I reminded them of Hazel, blah blah. I usually ignore book recommendations and that’s why I still haven’t read The Hunger Games and I KNOW I SHOULD I WILL, I PROMISE, and I’m generally an asshole-ish book snob.
But my friend Kate asked me to review the book for her site and i said, yeah, I haven’t written a lot of reviews in the past few years.
It goes without saying that reading this from the vantage point of a cancer patient (same kind as Hazel, though hers is stage IV and I tapped out at Ib or something, I forget) would be different had I read it as a normal, healthy functioning adult.
Hazel’s 15, which is a little bit older than I was when I got really sick. But this author, this John Green, he fucking nailed it.
I’ve read a ton of books about illness that have nailed it (Sarah Manguso, Joshua Cody and few others come to mind)…but this did it in my voice. I cried not only because it was beautiful but because it was so close to my own feelings about illness and how it affects your family and alienates your friends. It startled me, the accuracy.
I just can’t believe Hazel doesn’t have a Tumblr.
Anyway, lots of feelings and tears and laughs (pray to God my review will be actually written and not like this) but…
Read this fucking book.
