In a future totalitarian society where love is a disease, we follow a young girl, Lena Hathoway, who waits excitedly for her cure.  Until 89 days before her 18th birthday and the date of her cure, when she meets a boy from the “Wilds” and does the unthinkable.  She falls in love.

Lauren Oliver’s dystopian teen romance, Delirium, is a wonderfully emotional, heartbreaking love story, and if you have not already jumped on the dystopian bandwagon, I would suggest that reading Delirium is a very good start indeed. 

The idea behind the plot was by far one of the most interesting and unique I have ever come across-What if love was a disease?  The story was very well written and once I started reading, I could not put it down!  Every time something was resolved, there was a new twist waiting around the corner that was never expected.  The reader’s emotions are challenged by the author, whose masterful storytelling made me gasp, laugh, squirm, cry, my eyes widen, and my jaw drop.  This book, with its many plot twists and secrets, shocked me in ways I could not have imagined.

One of the many things that struck me about this book is how adroitly it is written.  Lauren Oliver has a talent for using the most beautiful, rich language and imagery to capture a moment perfectly. When reading novels, the reader usually tries to picture the scenes in their head, but sometimes it becomes blurry.  The reader may try to focus on a given sequence, but if the author hasn’t provided enough detail, it is extremely hard for them to do so.  All that being said, Lauren Oliver is the complete opposite.  She expertly describes every single scene to a tee, from the description of the setting to Lena’s emotions.  Because of this, the image of the scene in the reader’s mind’s eye comes out crystal clear.  Here is an example:

“The water is an enormous mirror, tipped with pink and gold from the sky. In that single, blazing moment as I came around the bend, the sun – curved over the dip of the horizon like a solid gold archway – lets out its final winking rays of light, shattering the darkness of the water, turning everything white for a fraction of a second, and then falls away, sinking, dragging the pink and the red and the purple out of the sky with it, all the colour bleeding away instantly and leaving only dark.

Alex was right. It was gorgeous – one of the best I’ve ever seen."

I would recommend this book for ages 11+, as violence and profanity play parts in this book.  For example a dog is clubbed to death and teens are clubbed, and mauled by the regulators’ dogs.  Blood is depicted and guns are fired.  Lena and Alex, her love interest, also meet illicitly and kiss, and she allows him to take her shirt off.

A combination of enthralling concepts, and a skilled and experienced author, make this book a must-read.  Although this is a mature book, it is incredibly well written and I would recommend that in addition to reading Delirium, read the rest of the trilogy, and possibly check out some of Oliver’s other books such as Before I Fall.

Check out Delirium at the Newport Beach Public Library.