John Green
2012
Penguin
pp. 313
The work of fiction by John Green revolves around the life of Hazel Grace. Her struggle against cancer and her family’s and friends’ attempt at ‘normalising’ her life have been portrayed in a matter of fact manner. The routinazing of medical support along with daily rituals gives a glimpse into what it means to be a cancer patient or a care giver for a cancer patient. Her parents’ attempt to coax her into stepping out of the house and leading the life of a teenager point to the need for taking care of social and emotional needs of patients. In some portions, Hazel also expresses concern for the isolation for her parents that results from the side effects of inordinate amount of time that they spend in taking care of her.
The Support Group, despite its boring routine, and repetitive conversations, plays an important role in Hazel’s life, helping her to build friendships and find love. Although she has sensitive friends who are not suffering from cancer, the empathetic, unsaid understanding between similar aged cancer patients is much stronger. It makes you wonder if developing close empathetic friendships with terminally ill patients is at all possible if you are not a fellow sufferer.
The book gives you many opportunities to think and reflect: dealing with death and dying; the routine of funerals; the influence of what books we read; using dying wishes; support of friends; true love; and life; among others.
It is written in simple language, and is a fairly quick read. I would recommend it to all.
Some quotes:
http://kitaabonmeinhulchal.blogspot.in/2016/03/the-fault-in-our-stars-green-john.html
Every book has a story:
An ebook was shared with me by one of my friends Alprata almost a year ago. I never got to reading it owing to my dislike of ebooks. This year’s books to read list that I developed with co-reader Kirti got me to reading it. I am glad that I did. Thank you both for getting me to read.