Book Club Pick: Fault in Our Stars

Our book club pick this month is the young adult novel,The Fault in Our Stars, about a teen girl fighting cancer.  There is also a movie out now based on this book.  I am at page 114 and Hazel, the teen battling cancer, wants to visit the reclusive writer of her favorite book, Peter Van Houten,  in Amsterdam with her new-found friend and love interest, Gus. Interestingly, Van Houten's book is about a girl who died of cancer and her story ends in the middle of a sentence to emphasize that the protagonist died or became too sick to complete her thought. Hazel wants to know "the rest of the story" such as what happened to the protagonist's Mom and her possibly con artist fiance.  It is odd that Hazel who is depressed about her own cancer diagnosis would choose Van Houten's book as her favorite.

This book is not as depressing as I thought it would be. It has a 4 1/2 star rating on amazon but I am not sure yet how I feel about it to give it my own rating.

Two coincidences occurred while reading this book.  One was that yesterday that Malaysian Airline that was shot out of the sky was flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpar.  I pause to express condolences to the families of all the passengers on that flight. Second, just minutes ago today, in the middle of my reading and listening to the TV, comedian Tig Notaro, a cancer survivor walked on the set of a talk-show to talk about her life with cancer and comedy. What message is the universe giving me?