The Fault in our Stars by John Green

Genre:  YA Contemporary

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Description (taken from Goodreads):

Despite the tumor-shrinking medical miracle that has bought her a few years, Hazel has never been anything but terminal, her final chapter inscribed upon diagnosis. But when a gorgeous plot twist named Augustus Waters suddenly appears at Cancer Kid Support Group, Hazel's story is about to be completely rewritten.

This book made me feel like I was getting into a teenager's head.  And not just any teenager, someone who's known for a long time that she's going to die.  The writing was beautiful.  The emotions were there.  The philosophical thoughts were amazing...

Hazel has been fighting cancer for quite some time.  A miracle has given her a few extra years to live, and she spends it fighting off her parents' ideas of her having a social life.  That is, until she meets Augustus and gets a social life.  Augustus and Hazel share their love of books and games, and they begin a quest to find someone who has been a big influence them.  It puts them on a ride called life, and only something like this could be as crazy as we expect it and as unplanned for as well as planned.

Personally, I loved Hazel's thoughts on life.  In the beginning she mentions the only thing worse than being a terminally-ill kid is being the terminally-ill kid's parents.  While I'm definitely not terminally ill, I do remember saying something along those lines in regards to my syndrome.  We also get to see how society treats her, and how we, as a society, can't really handle different people, especially the different that we think are dying soon.

This book is beautiful.  I can't really think of a word that describes it more perfectly than that although it doesn't really describe it perfectly.  I dont know.  Everyone says you need to read this one, and they're right.  You do need to read this one.

Challenges:  TBR Pile Reading Challenge