The Fault in Our Stars(16)

“Impossible to track down.”

“Correct.”

“Utterly unreachable,” Augustus said.

“Unfortunately so,” I said.

“‘Dear Mr. Waters,’” he answered. “‘I am writing to thank you for your electronic correspondence, received via Ms. Vliegenthart this sixth of April, from the United States of America, insofar as geography can be said to exist in our triumphantly digitized contemporaneity.’”

“Augustus, what the hell?”

“He has an assistant,” Augustus said. “Lidewij Vliegenthart. I found her. I emailed her. She gave him the email. He responded via her email account.”

“Okay, okay. Keep reading.”

“‘My response is being written with ink and paper in the glorious tradition of our ancestors and then transcribed by Ms. Vliegenthart into a series of 1s and 0s to travel through the insipid web which has lately ensnared our species, so I apologize for any errors or omissions that may result.

“‘Given the entertainment bacchanalia at the disposal of young men and women of your generation, I am grateful to anyone anywhere who sets aside the hours necessary to read my little book. But I am particularly indebted to you, sir, both for your kind words about An Imperial Affliction and for taking the time to tell me that the book, and here I quote you directly, “meant a great deal” to you.

“‘This comment, however, leads me to wonder: What do you mean by meant? Given the final futility of our struggle, is the fleeting jolt of meaning that art gives us valuable? Or is the only value in passing the time as comfortably as possible? What should a story seek to emulate, Augustus? A ringing alarm? A call to arms? A morphine drip? Of course, like all interrogation of the universe, this line of inquiry inevitably reduces us to asking what it means to be human and whether—to borrow a phrase from the angst-encumbered sixteen-year-olds you no doubt revile—there is a point to it all.

“‘I fear there is not, my friend, and that you would receive scant encouragement from further encounters with my writing. But to answer your question: No, I have not written anything else, nor will I. I do not feel that continuing to share my thoughts with readers would benefit either them or me. Thank you again for your generous email.

“‘Yours most sincerely, Peter Van Houten, via Lidewij Vliegenthart.’”

“Wow,” I said. “Are you making this up?”

“Hazel Grace, could I, with my meager intellectual capacities, make up a letter from Peter Van Houten featuring phrases like ‘our triumphantly digitized contemporaneity’?”

“You could not,” I allowed. “Can I, can I have the email address?”

“Of course,” Augustus said, like it was not the best gift ever.



I spent the next two hours writing an email to Peter Van Houten. It seemed to get worse each time I rewrote it, but I couldn’t stop myself.



Dear Mr. Peter Van Houten

(c/o Lidewij Vliegenthart),



My name is Hazel Grace Lancaster. My friend Augustus Waters, who read An Imperial Affliction at my recommendation, just received an email from you at this address. I hope you will not mind that Augustus shared that email with me.

Mr. Van Houten, I understand from your email to Augustus that you are not planning to publish any more books. In a way, I am disappointed, but I’m also relieved: I never have to worry whether your next book will live up to the magnificent perfection of the original. As a three-year survivor of Stage IV cancer, I can tell you that you got everything right in An Imperial Affliction. Or at least you got me right. Your book has a way of telling me what I’m feeling before I even feel it, and I’ve reread it dozens of times.

I wonder, though, if you would mind answering a couple questions I have about what happens after the end of the novel. I understand the book ends because Anna dies or becomes too ill to continue writing it, but I would really like to know what happens to Anna’s mom—whether she married the Dutch Tulip Man, whether she ever has another child, and whether she stays at 917 W. Temple, etc. Also, is the Dutch Tulip Man a fraud or does he really love them? What happens to Anna’s friends—particularly Claire and Jake? Do they stay together? And lastly—I realize that this is the kind of deep and thoughtful question you always hoped your readers would ask—what becomes of Sisyphus the Hamster? These questions have haunted me for years—and I don’t know how long I have left to get answers to them.

I know these are not important literary questions and that your book is full of important literary questions, but I would just really like to know.

And of course, if you ever do decide to write anything else, even if you don’t want to publish it, I’d love to read it. Frankly, I’d read your grocery lists.



Yours with great admiration,

Hazel Grace Lancaster

(age 16)



After I sent it, I called Augustus back, and we stayed up late talking about An Imperial Affliction, and I read him the Emily Dickinson poem that Van Houten had used for the title, and he said I had a good voice for reading and didn’t pause too long for the line breaks, and then he told me that the sixth Price of Dawn book, The Blood Approves, begins with a quote from a poem. It took him a minute to find the book, but finally he read the quote to me. “‘Say your life broke down. The last good kiss / You had was years ago.’”