John Green has written a fantastic book that is embodied in The Fault in Our Stars. The powerful combination of love and loss with some humor thrown in is illustrated in this exceptional novel. This book will grab hold of your attention and won’t let go until you read the last word.

Hazel Grace is forced to once again attend the weekly Cancer Support Group meeting when her mother notices her slightly depressing behavior. Hazel doesn’t understand why she should have to go to the group and hear the same speeches that she has heard so many times before. She definitely perks up when she spots the new member Augustus Waters staring at her as soon as she walks in the room. Augustus is attending the meeting to support Isaac, a support group friend of Hazel, who will lose his eyesight after undergoing a surgery in a few weeks. Later at the Water’s residents, Hazel and Augustus do a seemingly insignificant exchanging of their favorite books; but, this exchange turns out to be an extremely important part to the book.

And Imperial Affliction is the book that Augustus receives and he soon joins the band wagon with Hazel Grace about the ending of the book or more so the lack of an ending. An Imperial Affliction tells the story of a girl named Anna and her battles through cancer, and when it seems as if the book is at the plot it stops in the middle of a sentence. Here we have two Indianapolis teenagers yearning to know the ending of this great book, and in that we find the beginning of their adventure. The adventure of which I speak is when Augustus uses his ‘Make A Wish’ vacation to take Hazel and himself to Amsterdam where Peter Van Housten the author of An Imperial Affliction is currently residing.

Both a blessing and a curse the trip was valuable to the teens. A blessing because their relationship is an actual relationship now and a curse because we find out that one of the duo has been keeping a secret from the other. That secret is found in a PET Scan that displays that horrid thing that they had been avoiding for years, cancer. Here lies that achingly sad portion of the book that portrays the part about the loss.

This book will have you laughing with its silliness, next pondering life with its unique take of it; then finally it will have you crying with the depressing truth of life, death.