The Fault in Our Stars- John Green

I can't tell you when I first heard about this book.

I can't tell you why I wanted to read a book about a girl with cancer so badly that I not only bought two copies for my Library as soon as I saw it (read: found it after extensive searching): I also bought one for myself at roughly the same time.

I can tell you why I was crying for roughly the entire second half of the book.

But I won't.

There's a concept expressed in this book that I had heard of before but never meditated on, but as with many things with this book, now I can't stop thinking about it.

The fact is, once a book enters your hands and you start reading it, it does not belong to its author any more  Sure, they wrote the words; they created the characters and the world. But what you take away from the book will not be simply what they wanted you to: because you're not the author. Your life, your experiences, shape your views of the world and everything in it- including the books you read.

This is why I won't say what I took away from this book.

I won't tell you anything more about the plot than what the book jacket reveals: that it's about a girl named Hazel whose lungs fail at being lungs and a boy named Augustus with one leg. Two kids with cancer.

It's that cancer book I've been waiting to read for twenty odd years.

So go. Pick up a copy. Find a quiet spot. Keep the tissues handy. And... I hope you take something special away from this gem of a tale.