Author's Life

Personal Life:

John Micheal Green was born in Indianapolis, Indiana on August 24, 1977 to his parents Mike Green and Sydney Goodrich Green. John Green grew up in both Orlando, Florida and Birmingham, Alabama with his parents and younger brother, William Henry Green II. Green attended the Indian Springs School near Birmingham before venturing off to Kenyon College in Ohio. While attending, Green double majored in English and religious studies. Green graduated in 2000, where he started working as a student chaplain at a local children’s hospital and considered becoming a Episcopal priest. However, Green abandoned the thought of becoming a priest when his experiences with the hospital’s patients and the sadness and loss they endured inspired him to become a writer. Green started his writing career as a publishing assistant and production editor for the Chicago based book review magazine called Booklist. Green also wrote for National Public Radio’s All Things Considered along with the public radio station WBEZ. Green has published seven solo novels, 2 non-fiction novels, and has collaborated on several other novels. Green currently lives in Indianapolis Indiana with his wife, Sarah Urist Green, and their two kids, Henry Green and Alice Grace Green. Sarah Green was formerly a curator of contemporary art at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, and is the author of You Are the Artist: Assignments to Spark Creation, which was published in 2020. She also created The Art Assignment, an educational video series that helps explain art and its history.

Book Inspiration:

John Green used many of his own personal experiences for inspiration when writing his novels. Green’s first novel Looking for Alaska was published in 2005 and later won the 2006 Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in young adult literature. Green used his own schooling experiences when writing this novel and says that he likes writing for teenagers because “big questions—about love and religion and compassion and grief—matter to teens in a very visceral way.” Green’s second novel, An Abundance of Katherens, was published in 2006 and was named a Printz honor book in 2007. In the novel, Green created a dating theorem that he worked on with Daniel Bliss, a mathematician and assistant professor at the University of Chicago. The two of them proved them by using their own past girlfriends and other celebrities' relationships. Green’s third novel, Paper Towns, was published in 2008 and won a Mystery Writers of America Edgar Award in 2009 for best young adult book. Green used his own personal experiences from living in Orlando, Florida as inspiration for the novel. Green’s Paper Towns was later turned into a film in 2015. Green’s next novel Will Grayson, Will Grayson, was published in 2010 and was co-authored with David Levithan. Green’s next, and most popular novel, The Fault in Our Stars, was published in 2012 and has a movie adaptation in 2024. Green used his time working in the children’s hospital as inspiration for writing this novel. The Fault in Our Stars won the Children's Choice Book Award for Best Teen Book of the Year in 2013. The movie was rated the movie of the year in 2015 and has won the Teen Choice Awards in 2014. Green’s sixth novel, Turtles All the Way Down, was published in 2017 and had a film adaptation in 2024. Green used his personal experience with OCD as inspiration and contents of the novel. John Green was diagnosed with severe Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder when he was a child and has struggled with it throughout his whole life. Green says that this book is the most personal book he has ever written. Green’s seventh and newest novel Hollywood, Ending was published in 2026.

Vlogs/YouTube:

Along with becoming a New York TImes Best Selling Author, Green created different YouTube blogs and podcasts with his brother, Hank Green. Green and Hank created a youtube channel called VlogBrothers in 2007 where the two would do silly challenges within a four minute time limit. Fans of their vlog called themselves “NerdFighters” whose motto is “ to decrease world suck” and who help drive the Project for Awesome charity event. In 2010, the brothers cofounded VidCon, a massive convention and festival for online video creators, fans, and digital media executives. In 2011, the brothers created CrashCourse. CrashCourse is an educational YouTube channel that helps teach students about different topics such as: science, history, literature, and computer science. The brothers released their first full series about World History in January of 2012. In 2015, Green and Hank started a podcast called Dear Hank & John. On the podcast, the brothers talked about world events, gave insightful advice, and discussed the big and small questions of life. Green branched off and created his own podcast called The Anthropocene Reviewed from 2018 to 2020. Green later published some of his transcripts into a novel of the same title in 2021 and published Everything Is Tuberculosis, the history of the infectious disease, in 2025.

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