Book Review: The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

Publisher: Penguin Books Australia
Publishing Date:  January 11th 2012
Genre: YA, Contemporary
Format: e-ARC
Page count: 313 (paperback)

My rating:

3 of 5 hearts

My first thoughts:

LOOK WHO JUST GOT THIS ON NETGALLEY.

Thanks to Bekka (Pretty Deadly Reviews) for bringing it to my attention and Kelly-Jane for emotionally manhandling me to read it.

Here is a very brief and unfinished list of things I will cry over:

  • Kittens.
  • Family movies
  • Whenever anyone dies in a movie. Anyone. Even if they’re singing as they’re dying.
  • Whenever anyone is heroic in a movie – take Wall.E for example. I cried twice.
  • The opening sequence of UP had me bawling like a baby. We’re not allowed to watch it in my house.
  • Commercials with baby animals.
  • Commercials to save the wildlife or starving children in Africa.
  • Doctor Who (except the Eleventh, because the writing in those series sucks)
  • Weddings – even if it’s a fictional wedding.
  • Funerals – even if I didn’t know the person.
  • Babies.

I asked my husband to help me remember which books made me cry, and we came up with this very short and incomplete list:

  • Lauren DeStafano’s Wither* and Fever
  • Lauren Oliver’s Before I Fall
  • Anne McCaffrey’s The MasterHarper of Pern
  • Cynthia Hand’s Unearthly
  • Heather Dixon’s Entwined
  • Suzanne Collins’ The Hunger Games
  • Kristen Cashore’s Fire
  • Amy Kathleen Ryan’s Glow
  • Maria V Snyder’s Inside Out
  • JK Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
  • Alexandra Bracken’s Darkest Minds
  • Kat Zhang’s What’s Left of Me

It doesn’t take a lot. All it takes is beautiful writing and a strong emotional connection. *In the case of Wither, it doesn’t even have to be a connection to a character I like.

I suffer from depression and I’m an over-emotional person. A close friend recently passed away from cancer. I had hoped that this book would help me deal with that grief, but all I got was a depressed sick girl with no personality and a boring douche guy, and their obsession with what happens after a book they both read ends dramatically, and how the guy would do absolutely anything for the girl and how sorry for herself the girl feels. Maybe it was realistic – I can’t be the judge. And I didn’t hate it, I just had absolutely no connection to any character. Neither did I find it boring – I was simply detached, and cannot see the merits of either of the lead characters. This does not get a ‘Cancer Perk’ 5 stars because it’s a cancer book or because the leads were cancer sufferers. I was just not invested.

This book did not make me cry.

Not once.

Not a sniffle.

Not a welling of an unshed tear.

Just meh.

I’m not sure why Penguin Books Australia were giving this away on Netgalley (one year anniversary?), but that’s where I got my copy from.

View all my reviews

Nemo
Nemo

About Nemo

A lover of kittens and all things sparkly, Nemo has a degree in English Literature and specialises in reviewing contemporary, paranormal, mystery/thriller, historical, sci-fi and fantasy Young Adult fiction. She is especially drawn to novels about princesses, strong female friendships, magical powers, and assassins.

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 1,835 other subscribers