Why the John Green Wrote "A Fault in Our Stars"

Along with Fahrenheit 451, I have also been reading A Fault in Our Stars, which is now one of my favorite books. A Fault in Our Stars is about a girl, Hazel, who has thyroid cancer and dysfunctional lungs. She meets a boy, Augustus, at a support group she goes to and becomes very fond of him. Like Hazel, Augustus also had cancer but had been cured. The feelings happen to be mutual and together, they venture to Amsterdam to meet the author of their favorite book. After meeting the author, who turns out to be a total jerk, the two site-see different places for a while. While site-seeing, Hazel notices how uncomfortable Augustus looks doing basic and easy activities, such as walking and climbing stairs. When they get back to the small hotel, Augustus reveals that he had a reoccurrence of the cancer, except this time it was all over his body. I am now reading the part where Augustus is in a new trial for some medicines, hoping to cure his cancer.

While reading this book, I often wonder why John Green chose to write about such a sad, frightening topic. Has he had experience with cancer himself? Did someone he love have cancer? How did he know the feelings these teenagers were going through? The book is written entirely in Hazel's perspective and her witty thoughts and comments would have made me believe that the book was in-fact written by a teenager going through these problems herself. After some research, however, I learned that John Green did know a teenage girl going through this situation who totally changed his view on cancer, sickness, and death. Before meeting Esther Earl, cancer victim who was close with John, he had been struggling with writing this book. After meeting Esther, he got many new ideas and views on cancer and death.