Where to start...

It's worth noting that this is not the sort of book I usually read, and my main motivation for reading it was because I was fed up of people asking me, which was never going to be a great start.

Obviously this book is notoriously a weeper, and for about 20% of the book I was an emotional wreck; the characters (at that point) and the situation were too real and too awful and it was heartbreaking.

My issue is with the other 80%. For most of the book, I had to put up with two pretentious kids who love an even more pretentious book filled with pretentious metaphors. The almost painful insta-love followed by many chapters of 'denial' before some weird kiss in the Anne Frank house (I have been there and seriously, it's the least romantic place and people would absolutely not applaud you for making out in there). It feels like the fact that they have cancer is used as an excuse for everything; the poor characterisation, the damn metaphors, the questionable moral decisions (especially for a book which was also bound to do well and be read by people perhaps as young as 12?!).

That 20% was what saved this book. Just a shame about the rest of it.