The Fault in Our Stars

Solid and sweet, I read this in about an afternoon and got appropriately choked up. But I was a bit disappointed, as I expected a Visionary Teen Book akin to The Perks of Being A Wallflower (which felt more wise), or Feed (which exhibited much more existential despair). This wasn't so much visionary as pedestrian and OK.

The titular “fault” refers to the characters' unfortunate cancer diagnoses, and it is cancer - especially the existential senselessness of suffering and disease - that is an important third wheel to the main love story. And, indeed, it's an occasionally bare bones, relatively honest (I think) look at living with a terminal illness. But I also found it - gimmicky? A little too self-aware? The two main teens, Augustus and Hazel, are cute, sarcastic and literary - to the point of preciousness. Their Amsterdam trip, while pretty glorious, also felt a little cliché. (And, if anyone can do the whole “meeting with your dream author only to find he's a drunken douchebag” scene, it is the highly wonderful graphic novel, Saga.)

B? Maybe a B-.