John Green got an astronomical following from his books. What came next? ‘I’m still competing for clicks’

John Green: ‘I suspect that young people want to be famous for the same reason I wanted public attention, which is that I thought it would fill a hole inside of me.’ Photograph: Marina Water

By his mid-30s, John Green had done pretty well for himself. His debut novel, Looking for Alaska, had won a prestigious award for young adult literature. He and his brother, Hank, had launched a popular YouTube channel, where they regularly posted videos about their lives. With their combined incomes, Green and his wife were able to cobble together a living, buying a house and starting a family in Indianapolis.

And then, in 2012, he published The Fault in Our Stars.