Freesia

YA dystopia/post-apocalyptic was the genre that got me into reading when I was younger, and with this being dubbed as the OG dystopia (first published in 1993) novel, I just had to read it. I also watched the movie adaptation a few years ago and liked it, and more recently, a university classmate who I had a crush on mentioned that this was his favourite book, so obviously I am going to read it.

I found that it did not feel like a YA book at all, it read more kid-ish, and this might be because of the standardised language the citizens of the Community are required to use. Everything is standardised, which gave a technical feel to the world. Sameness, they called it. Sameness was the ideal, Sameness meant everything is perfect.

The main character, Jonas, is likeable and easy to empathise with. I think that if I had come to the novel cold, I would have been just as frustrated as Jonah was, trying to make sense of all that he is finding out about this seemingly flawless world. But of course, we know that it isn't perfect at all. It raises interesting questions- whether having potentially disruptive knowledge and information purposefully hidden is ethical or not, is it better to have limited choices to ensure stability, and oh, how would you feel if your big, life decisions, like what your career and who your spouse and children would be, were mandated by a system and the government?

The book ended on a hopeful note, a cliffhanger which I felt was a perfect segway into the next novel in the series. I have not gotten my hands on it yet, but because this was a good read, I intend to do so.

My first Stephen King novel!!
Is it puny if I say I was very miserable reading this? It started out so slow and took so long to pick up to a pace I like. Maybe I'm just not a fan of this genre?? I don't know. Contemplated giving a 2 or 3 star rating - but 3 stars means I would most probably pick up another novel of his but I don't see myself doing that in a long time, at least.

Would I recommend this book? Not really. Did I learn anything from it? Sorta.

Maybe I just didn't like the style of the book- sometimes it felt a bit boastful, and it wasn't clear what sort of tone this book was taking. There were some useful advice and sound ideas, but I wouldn't take everything I read as gospel. The online test was interesting to take.

Oh my God oh my God oh my God. This has been the best book I have read in 2012, no lie. I feel like I'm the last person to read this but oh my God I really have no words right now.

I accidentally read a few spoilers but nonetheless I was not expecting the ending AT ALL. I actually had to stop reading the book halfway and give it a two day break to catch my breath. But oh this was so good. I can't even. Omg.

Some parts of the book did feel a bit off, where the paragraphs don't seem to fit, but otherwise - a utterly amazing read.

God. It was difficult to read in the beginning because the set up of the story world wasn't clear, and I got the names of the characters mixed up along the way. Other than that it was an exciting read, although the pace of the book was slow. The pay-off wasn't that fantastic but it was an amazing read because of the imagination and thought put into it.

So much love for this book!!!!

Really felt like I was discovering a part of my heritage I somehow knew existed, but revisited it with touching stories to boot.

Thought-provoking at times, but otherwise sentimental and a beautiful and wonderful read.

Recommended to everyone!!!! SUPPORT LOCAL TALENT!!!!!!!!

I don't know, I was kinda disappointed by this. The alternating then and now chapters were annoying, and got me confused from time to time. I felt it was rather cheesy for me... or maybe romance isn't a genre for me.

But it was a good insight to Annabelle's brain, I just felt it could be executed a little bit better.

I really liked this. Mostly because I like Hana's character - it was good to get the perspective of the “perfect best friend” and find out her side of the story. This also definitely filled up some gaps in Delirium! Would recommend reading this after completing the trilogy since it does contain spoilers.

This was actually really, really good. Raven was one of the characters I grew to love reading the series - and it was nice to finally (!) get inside her head. Her story was very quick, yet it captured and explained almost all her motives in the books. A very nice read, and I would mind a Raven part 2.

It was an eye opening read. Great concept but I sometimes found it hard to follow. Got lost while reading. Not really a favourite style of writing I guess. But the last part was mind blowing and I actually like reading what the author had to say about the book. I usually skip those parts but somehow I didn't for this book and I'm glad I took the time to read the afterword.

It has been years since I read the Delirium series, and I left my YA-dystopia-post-apocalyptic phase waaaaaaaaay behind me. This was the only short-story from the series that I haven't read yet and one day, I saw it staring right at me at the local library. I was in a reading slump, my current reading interests weren't doing anything, so I was hoping an old favourite would get me out of the funk.

Spoiler: It didn't actually do that.

BUT! It was nice to have a sense of “completion”, having now read everything from the Delirium universe. I don't remember much of the plot (let's be real), and reading my past reviews revealed to me that I had a love -> hate relationship with this particular character. The writing was snappy and clear, though a bit melodramatic at times. I think it would have been a great accompanying read alongside the main books.

SO HEART-WRENCHING OMG.

I watched the movie adaptation before this, and I knew what to expect, but it was still so, so sad to read. I had to remind myself to breathe every so often because I was so stricken. I kept wondering why Khaleed Hosseini made me read such depressing stories :(

A beautiful read.