Delirium by Lauren Oliver

I don’t know why the heck I put off reading this book as long as I did. It’s been on my desk for like a month and I guess I was intimidated by the size of it (nearly 450 pages!) and the hype. I didn’t want to be disappointed. Well I’m super happy to say that I wasn’t! This book is totally worth the hype!

When the story starts out, Lena is basically one of society’s clones. She believes love—the deliria— is a disease. She can’t wait to get the cure. She’s excited and eager. She believes that the government and random house raids are all there for her protection. She’s totally wrong.

Normally I get frustrated when there’s a naive “buy into what society tells you” kind of girl in a book. While I didn’t love it in Delirium, at least I understood it. Lena didn’t know any better. She grew up being taught that love is a horrible life-ruining thing that needs to be cured. I couldn’t really blame her for believing what she was taught. And she does slowly start to come out of her shell and actually see the real world around her, and start dipping her toes into the world of love!

I loved how even though Delirium is a futuristic dystopian book, there were so many parts that felt exactly like life today. I mean they still had school, graduation, sleepovers, and other than the whole deliria thing society felt pretty similar. I could totally relate to Lena and her best friend. They did everything together and supported each other, but there were also times when they started finding differences between themselves and drifting apart. It felt like a very realistic relationship!

And ohmygod the romance. OH MY GOD! It’s forbidden, it’s awesome, it’s sexy, there’s kissing, and then there’s more kissing, and late-night-beach outings, and oh my god THE KISSING!!!! I absolutely loved Alex and Lena. Their relationship was so pure and so… I don’t know. SQUEE!! I like how there were no stupid petty arguments. At one point I thought I saw one coming on, but I was pleasantly surprised to see it not turn into an argument at all. I hate it in books when the girl is doing something with a different guy that looks bad from the outside, but really there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation. But then the other main male just gets pissed off and doesn’t listen to her explanation so it all gets blown out of proportion and it’s just stupid and petty. There was none of that in Delirium! Alex was totally reasonable and understanding and awesome! And I loved how he was always open, honest, and patient with Lena. Their relationship was just so yummy!!!

I enjoyed the first 350 pages, but it was really the last 100 that had me screaming for absolute joy and loving this book with every fiber of my being! Towards the end things get totally intensified and the plot is like OH MY GOD and the surprises are like HOLY CRAP and the love is like KISS ME NOW.

I loved how I was never able to guess the ending. There were so many endings that would have made sense that I could never pinpoint what it was going to be. Would Lena get the cure but somehow be resistent to it like her mom was? Would Lena try to take down the government? Would she run away? Would she go into hiding? And how would Alex tie in? Would the ending be happy or sad? I had no idea! And I loved how there were a few things that hit me out of nowhere. Maybe in hindsight they totally make sense and might even be kind of obvious, but in the moment I totally didn’t even consider them so it was full of surprises!

The Verdict