Review
Title: Delirium
Author: Lauren Oliver
Genre: Dystopia, Romance, Young Adult
Rating: ★★★
____
Amor deliria nervosa, n. also known as “love” in the old times, this is a disease that can kill you both when you have it and when you don’t. Symptoms include preoccupation, impaired reasoning skills, periods of euphoria, obsessive thoughts, etc. Unless there are emergencies, everyone is scheduled to be “cured” at the age of eighteen; everyone also undergoes “evaluation,” where your future husband/wife is assigned to you based on your answers to some questions. All uncureds are required to stay away from the opposite sex.
Can anyone really be safe and happy in a world where love is considered a fatal ailment? What will you do if you finally realize that the fences that are supposed to protect you are also caging you from the truth? This is the tilt where Lauren Oliver’s dystopian world in Delirium rotates, and in the middle of it all is a plain teenager who can’t wait to be cured, Lena Haloway.
It’s no secret that I’m infected by the dystopian/post-apocalyptic virus that’s continuously spreading in the world of literature nowadays, particularly in the young adult department. I haven’t read a lot of novels under this genre, but it’s easy to pick up common themes. Rebellion/resistance is at the hub of most books, its automatic spoke consisting of defiant protagonists that go against the established laws and take down the abusive government…mostly in the course of three books. The Hunger Games trilogy is by far my favorite, and truth be told I think it set the bar in this genre. I plan to bury my nose in more post-apocalyptic books, but I tend to delay reading those that use the same formula as THG. Then came a story about “love” as a sickness, and I thought, “That sure is a catchy idea!” I readily grabbed it from the shelf.
It’s true that the best way to enjoy new books is not to get your hopes too high. I liked Oliver’s debut novel Before I Fall, but I really can’t say the same for Delirium.
Delirium’s main idea is appealing and I wanted to find out how its author will deal with the domino-like line of questions that pops out after the concept is laid down. In my opinion, Oliver isn’t so successful in answering them. The origin of love as a mental illness (the whole package—the when’s, the who’s, and even the how’s) is not thoroughly discussed. Obviously there is government resistance, and my first hunch is that the “cure” is more than what it seems. In my mind, the government is transforming the world of love into a world of apathy through these vague brain surgeries because they don’t want the people to be angered and to revolt against them, in fear that they may end up like the rest of the world, destroyed perhaps by wars. Okay, maybe that’s just my overactive imagination—let’s say they just want to control the people like inanimate objects while feeding them the idea that they’re safe and sound. I can feel that Oliver has something up her sleeve, but I never got to learn what that is. Maybe I’ll find it out in the sequels, but if that’s the case, then Delirium as the first installment did not quite achieve its goal of cementing a strong foundation. Leaving questions normally makes the reader go hungry for more, but leaving too much makes the story look like a Swiss Cheese, full of plot holes.
Speaking of plot holes, I’d like to point out the very big flaw in the “Law of Segregation” in this book’s universe, where boys and girls are separated because they may fall in love. How about LGBTQ? Boys can love boys. Girls can love girls. It’s impossible that there’s no record of this. In a world where love is already considered dangerous, how do they deal with same-sex amor deliria nervosa? I think that will be interesting to explore because even in our society today, homosexuality is already considered by many as a disease. I hope Oliver will prove me wrong, that it’s not a flaw at all and it’s just waiting to be solved; I hope she touches this kind of love in the next installments, and touches it effectively.
If the epigraphs that came from fictional pamphlets and textbooks in that world were not included, the plot and the world-building will appear so thin. The characters are okay albeit bordering on stereotypical young adults. Most of the time, Lena is toddling precariously on the edge of being a Mary Sue, occasionally showing Bella Swan-esque qualities. Her thought processes are pretty interesting and thought-provoking though, and sometimes her memories can subtly break your heart (I’ll give her that). Alex is the regular love interest—you know, the once mysterious guy now sitting with you under the stars and reading romantic poetry. There are two more books, so there’s more room for them to develop.
When it comes to originality, Delirium doesn’t stand out that much. It’s strikingly similar to Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies series (dead ringers—just replace the word “love” with “ugliness”), and I’ve also heard of this book called Matched by Allie Condie, which shares a few similar concepts with Delirium, particularly the prearranged matches.
There are a few things that redeemed this book for me. One is how Oliver showed that hate is not really the worst thing but indifference. She painted horrifying images that can make you think. I realized how without love, everything seems to be an insipid dollhouse; the people inside are marionettes trying to function normally according to the pattern that everyone else is following. It’s a choreographed world. Imagine a family that is only a family because it’s dictated by the authority; imagine how all the movies, music, and books that come your way never deal with anything that can tug at your heartstrings. What’s the point? Eradicating love is like taking away everything that matters, and it’s a very harrowing thought.
Second is Oliver’s writing style. It’s quite different from Before I Fall, but I caught glimpses of the poetic curls at the edges of her prose. They’re usually overlapped by the book’s initial slow pacing, but they’re still there.
Third is the climax at the end. I think that’s what really made me decide not to completely rule out reading Pandemonium, the sequel. :)
LJinto took some photos of my group and I in Sandman at San Diego Comic Con this year! Sooo happy with how these turned out! <3
omg DELIRIUM! This is so made of cool. :D
This blog also needs an awesome Delirium cosplay kthnxbai.
BOOK HAUL (September-October reads)
Currently Reading, To-Read, and To-Reread
- A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan. Status: Currently Reading. I’m only a couple of chapters in, and so far I’m liking it. It’s like a collection of interconnected short stories, mostly about an ex-punk rocker/ record executive and his kleptomaniac secretary. Music galore on every page! I’ve been meaning to read this ever since I got to Good Reads. This book won the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
- Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. Status: To-read. Set in futuristic America, this is a dystopian novel where the masses are hedonistic and critical thinking through reading is outlawed (thanks, Wiki). The title is said to refer to the temperature at which book paper combusts.
- The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon. Status: To-read. About an autistic fifteen-year-old and a murder mystery concerning his neighbor’s poodle. Everyone’s got a nerd boner for this. I got to find out why.
- The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson. Status: To-read. First in the Swedish crime series called the “Millennium Trilogy,” this novel concerns the disappearance of Harriet Vanger, a scion of one of Sweden’s wealthiest families, and how her uncle continues to seek the truth. He hires a journalist to investigate, who in turn is helped by a tattooed punk prodigy.
- The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky. Status: To-reread. An epistolary coming-of-age novel centering on an introvert kid who calls himself Charlie. I’ve read this on e-book format last year, and I was more than happy to stumble upon a copy of it on Book Sale. This one reads like a direct descendant of J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye. I just felt like reading it again sans the terrible eye pain caused by the computer screen. :P
- The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. Status: To-read. A semi-autobiographical novel concerning a young, talented woman’s descent into mental illness while she is working as an intern for a magazine in 1950s New York City.
- Wide Awake by David Levithan. Status: To-read. Set in futuristic America where a gay Jewish president is elected. It’s about time I read something…political by Levithan! :P
- Sputnik Sweetheart by Haruki Murakami. Status: To-read. It’s been a while since I last read something by this awesome author! Based on the reviews I’ve heard, it is apparent that Murakami’s three L’s are present in this novel—love, loss, loneliness. This time, though, it looks like there’s an additional L: lesbianism.
- The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. Status: To-reread. What do you mean I just read this?
Leave me alone, this is how I roll. - The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. Status: To-reread. It tells the story of unlikely friendship between two boys: Amir, son of a rich Afghan businessman, and Hassan, son of his father’s servant. More when I finally make a review for this! :P
- Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer. Status: to-read. It’s about nine-year-old Oskar Schell and his search for the matching lock of the key that belongs to his father, who died in the World Trade Center in the morning of September 11. I wanted to read Foer’s Everything is Illuminated first, but I can’t find it. :( So yeah, this is going to be my first Foer read.
- Luna by Julie Anne Peters. Status: To-read; lent by my friend Venus. “Yeah, I loved her. I couldn’t help it. She was my brother.” About a transsexual boy named Liam, who changes his name to Luna when the sun sets.
- Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs. Status: To-read. “On an island off the coast of Wales, there was once a home for peculiar children, and one of the children who lived there was Jacob’s grandfather. He told Jacob stories about the children—the girl who could fly, the boy who had bees living inside him, the brother and sister who could lift boulders…” Honestly, it sounds like Professor Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngsters from X-Men. But I’m going to give this a try because The John Green recommended it. :)
- Delirium by Lauren Oliver. A dystopian young adult novel where love is considered a fatal disease (amor deliria nervosa). Don’t mind me, I just need something to fill my Hunger Games void. :P
- Hanging Out with the Dream King: Conversations with Neil Gaiman and his Collaborators. Status: To-read; again lent by my friend Venus. A collection of interviews with Neil Gaiman, Terry Pratchett, Dave McKean, Tori Amos(!), Colleen Doran, and many more. A Gaiman fan must-have. :)
- Looking Glass Wars by Frank Beddor. Status: To-reread. Inspired by Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. The premise is that Carroll distorted the true events that happened in Wonderland, making its history nothing but a nonsensical book for kids. The real events are told in this book. (Not in the picture because my friend is currently reading it lol)
Have any of you read some of my to-read books? What should I expect from them?
The Endless (diminutive edition!)
The Endless (from Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman series) are entities that are neither mortals nor gods. They are the anthropomorphic personifications of abstract concepts and are older than the rest of the universe: Destiny, Death, Dream, Destruction, Desire, Despair, and Delirium.
Jill Thompson illustrated the said entities in a cute style inspired by DC Comics characters Sugar and Spike. All seven siblings appeared in her The Little Endless Storybook, produced in the wake of the positive reader reaction when they saw little Dream and little Death in the Sandman’s fortieth issue, The Parliament of Rooks.
The adorableness of each Endless is just killing me, and I can’t help but give them a little space here in my blog. :p So here they are, with some info:
______
1. DESTINY
Destiny is the oldest among the Endless. To mortal eyes, he is the tallest in his family; he casts no shadow nor does he leave any footprints. He is depicted as a man cloaked and hooded in grey/purple/brown robes, and is chained to a thick book called the Cosmic Log, where everyone’s/everything’s stories are written. He is said to smell of dusts and old libraries.
He is cold, somber, and very dedicated to his work. “There are some who believe him to be blind; whilst others, perhaps with more reason, claimed that he has traveled far beyond blindness, that indeed, he can do nothing but see [everything].”
______
2. DEATH
While everyone’s stereotype of the concept of demise is a scary skeleton wielding a scythe, Death of the Endless is actually the opposite—instead of some creature inspiring terror, she is a down-to-earth friend. Unlike Destiny, she is warm and caring. She is depicted as a pale Goth girl wearing a silver ankh (ironically the Egyptian symbol for “life”) and an eye-of-Horus tattoo around one eye. She is known to have a sense of humor, gentle wisdom, a quirky upbeat personality…a floppy hat collection and two goldfish (I’m serious).
“One day in every century, Death takes on mortal flesh, to better comprehend what the lives she takes must feel like, to taste the bitter tang of mortality: this is the price she must pay for being the divider of the living from all that has gone before and all that must come after.”
______
3. DREAM
Dream is—as stated in Season of Mists—a conundrum. To human eyes he’s tall and “rake-thin, with skin the color of falling snow” (think of The Cure’s lead singer Robert Smith, only a tad skinnier). His appearance actually varies depending on who’s looking at him: a Martian sees him as a disembodied energy being, a cat sees him as a cat, humans see him as human and so on.
He is sometimes slow when dealing with humor, occasionally insensitive, often self-obsessed, and is very slow to forgive or forget a slight (also, he has a very bad list of love lives). If he is close to anyone, it is to his older sister Death.
______
4. DESTRUCTION
Destruction is the fourth oldest Endless, portrayed as a big man with red hair and beard. He is Dream’s immediately younger sibling but in many ways wiser and more aware of the Endless’ place in the universe. He is warm, affectionate, and the best humored; aside from Death, he projects as a character that is opposite of the concept he portrays.
He “resigns” and abandons his realm when he foresaw that mankind will eventually use science as a tool of mass destruction (i.e. the atomic bombs). He refuses to be responsible for this, and lets humans be the cause of their own destruction. He leaves and is referred to as “The Prodigal”; instead of destroying, he goes on and creates things. He paints, helps in construction work, cooks, etc.
______
5. DESPAIR
Despair is Desire’s twin sister, and is depicted as a squat, flabby, ugly naked woman. Her skin is said to be cold and clammy, and her eyes has “the colour of sky, on the grey, wet days that leach the world of colour and meaning”. She has no odor, but her shadow smells musky and pungent. She wears a ring with a hook on her left hand, with which she occasionally carves her skin.
“It is said that scattered through Despair’s domain are a multitude of tiny windows, hanging in the void. Each window looks out on a different scene, being, in our world, a mirror. Sometimes you will look into a mirror and feel the eyes of Despair upon you, feel her hook catch and snag upon your heart.”
______
6. DESIRE
Despair’s twin, Desire is usually portrayed as an androgynous being; he/she/it is both and at the same time neither male nor female. He/she/it is of medium height, has pale skin and yellow eyes, smells faintly of summer peaches and casts two shadows: one black and sharp-edged, the other translucent and wavering. He/she/it is very malicious, engaging in games that interfere with the other Endless’ affairs (particularly Dream’s).
“It is unlikely that any portrait will ever do Desire any justice, since to see her (or him) is to love him (or her)—passionately, painfully, to the exclusion of all else….Desire is everything you have ever wanted, whoever you are, whatever you are. Everything.”
______
7. DELIRIUM
Delirium is the youngest of the Endless yet still older than the rest of existence. Her appearance is more variable compared to that of her other siblings, but she’s usually portrayed as a young girl with wild, vibrantly colored hair and heterochromia: one eye is blue and the other one is green. Some people say that her mismatched eyes are a reminder that Delirium had a tragedy once, for before she was called Delight. Nobody knows the real reason behind her transformation.
She is said to smell of “sweat, sour wines, late nights, and old leather”. Her shadow never matches the shape of her body, and it is tangible like velvet.
_____
Images (save the first one) came from The Little Endless Storybook by Jill Thompson. All characters by Neil Gaiman.
Character of the Day. Delirium from Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman series. Delirium is the youngest among the Endless, yet she is older than the rest of existence. She is often depicted as a little girl with heterochromia—one of her eyes is blue and the other is green; whatever Delirium sees through them, no one knows. Her hair changes constantly as well as her clothes. Her shadow never reflects her shape, and is tangible, like velvet. She is said to smell of sweat, late nights, sour wine, and old leather. Her realm is a chaotic, constantly changing mass of colors and strange objects and shapes, and contains a sundial with the inscription “Tempus Frangit” (“time breaks,” a Latin pun on the phrase “Tempus Fugit”, “time flies”.) Delirium travels with a “guardian” of sorts, a German Shepherd dog named Barnabas, on indefinite loan from her brother Destruction.
Delirium is once called Delight, but whatever caused her transformation is not known even by her brother Destiny.
