Delirium, by Lauren Oliver

Release Date: February 1st, 2011

Good Reads Says: Before scientists found the cure, people thought love was a good thing. They didn’t understand that once love - the deliria - blooms in your blood, there is no escaping its hold. Things are different now. Scientists are able to eradicate love, and the governments demands that all citizens receive the cure upon turning eighteen. Lena Holoway has always looked forward to the day when she’ll be cured. A life without love is a life without pain: safe, measured, predictable, and happy. 

But with ninety-five days left until her treatment, Lena does the unthinkable: She falls in love.

I Say:
Holy monkeys and pandas, dude.
This book?
Nightmares. Do you know the last book that gave me nightmares?
Oh. You don't? (Wait, you don't know my every thought? -blinks- Huh.)
Anyway, I guess I can't be too annoyed by that since I don't even remember.  And yet, I woke up at 3 in the morning, decided to finish the book, and went back to sleep at 4. I then went on to dream and wake up totally freaked out.
Here's the thing that makes Delirium scary--it makes sense.
I have had a sucky time with boys lately. I don't like feeling sad, depressed, angry, that whole shebang. So when I picked up Delirium, I was half thinking, hey, a government that takes away the side affects of that? Creepy, I guess, but not that bad.
Yeah.
Dude.
That bad.
Lena is ready. Lena doesn't want to feel love. She's scared of it. Doesn't even want to say the word. She lives in a world that is eerily similar to ours, and at the same time, is incredibly different. She doesn't know what poetry is, and a mother that declared love is considered shameful. A mark on her record. Lena wants her emotions gone. And--I mean, as creepy as it is, there's a weird sense to it.
But then you see it in action.
And Lauren Oliver's writing is so flipping beautiful. The writing is not as pretty as that of Before I Fall, but there are still brilliant moments. The plot is not always fast, but I promise--the end? Yeah. The last ten pages are so slam packed and so heart jolting that its definitely worth getting there.
The back of the book compared Delirium to the danger of Hunger Games and the romance of Romeo and Juliet. It's scary in a different way than Hunger Games, because it seems, in a way, more realistic. And as for romance? The boy Lena falls for is -- interesting. She falls pretty quickly, but at the same time, it makes sense. She's never even talked to boys before, and the budding relationship seemed realistic enough. But the way the story built and twined and grew?
Yeah.
Waaaaay more romantic than Romeo and Juliet. (Of course, I do have a low opinion of that play. Cept the version with Leonardo Di Caprio as Romeo.)

(Lord, the boy be pretty.)
Anyway.
Bottom line: Sometimes, true enough, the story did drag. The prose was beautiful, and the characters/society were believable, if not as mind numbingly fantastic as those in Before I Fall (which, actually, is one of my top reads, though -- so yeah) (Actually, had a friend start randomly talking about BIF yesterday. Seriously. She had no idea that I loved it, but she raved for like, ten minutes. It was kind of great.) But Lauren Oliver shows you a society that is absolutely terrifying. And I am thinking about it. I am unsettled and bothered and that, to me, is what makes a good book. I can't get the dang thing out of my head.
And now?
I don't want my feelings gone. These crappy feelings, these awful feelings -- they're better than nothing. Indifference is terrifying. I've always believed it, but I gotta say, Delirium reminded me. And kind of smacked me in the process. With a ten pound weight.
It's thought provoking, y'all. Be ready. And, to finish it off, the Amazon quote--

Ninety-five days, and then I'll be safe. I wonder whether the procedure will hurt. I want to get it over with. It's hard to be patient. It's hard not to be afraid while I'm still uncured, though so far the deliria hasn't touched me yet. Still, I worry. They say that in the old days, love drove people to madness. The deadliest of all deadly things: It kills you both when you have it and when you don't.

Gah. -shivers-
More later, everyone.