It's interesting to me that this book begins with a notice that it is not a true story, as I think I would feel much differently about this book if it were. Instead, this book is soaked in capital-i Importance, practically overflowing with quotables and Feelings and characters speaking in heavy metaphor and knowing off the top of their head the exact perfect poem for the exact moment they're in. It's like John Green has turned "clever" into an art form and then immediately killed that same art form by overdoing it. 
 I was very taken in by the beginning of this book. I don't mind when characters speak quickly and smartly in a way no human can manage. I love Aaron Sorkin, for instance. However, as the book wore on, I realized the difference is that Sorkin at least attempts to distinguish his characters from each other beyond the superficial. His (and most good writers') characters needs, desires, quirks, faults, etc. all blend together to make them a unique person. Not so with The Fault in Our Stars. Instead, we get what appear to be a bunch of John Greens. There's Girl John Green (Hazel), who loves poetry and thinks deep thoughts and wants to make the world a better place and has cancer. Then there's Boy John Green (Augustus), who loves poetry and thinks deep thoughts and wants to make the world a better place and has cancer. Then there are a bunch of supporting John Greens who are in various stages of cancer and all think deep thoughts and blah blah blah. Everybody speaks the same, thinks the same, seems to want the same things. It's borderline maddening. 
 I like what Green was going for with this book. As someone who used to work in a cancer hospital, I'm aware of a lot of the ways different people deal with the disease, and I think Green did a great job trying to humanize and expand upon "cancer stories," as it were. This isn't sap (at least not usually), and it isn't patronizing. He gives his characters true, frustrating, sometimes defeatist and sometimes hopeful attitudes about their illness, and I appreciate his contribution to the discussion in this regard. 
 However, as a book, this just didn't do it for me. As the characters continued to speak in Capitalizations and weighty metaphors, I lost any emotional attachment I had to them as human beings going through an incredibly difficult disease. They started coming off like quote robots, churning out precocious cool kid talk meant to make this seem like a book that is not manipulating your emotions, all the while fulling manipulating your emotions with extreme dexterity. 
 I wish I had liked this more. I really wanted to like it, but it's just too much. If I met people that spoke like this in real life, I would find my first excuse to leave them, and these are characters we're meant to love. So, if this is the best John Green has to offer, you can rest assured I won't be reading anything else.