1984 by George Orwell

Title: 1984

Author: George Orwell

Pages: 326

Genre: History, Dystopian, Science-Fiction, Classic

Book Description:

While 1984 has come and gone, Orwell's narrative is more timely that ever.1984 presents a "negative utopia", that is at once a startling and haunting vision of the world — so powerful that it's completely convincing from start to finish. No one can deny the power of this novel, its hold on the imaginations of entire generations of readers, or the resiliency of its admonitions — a legacy that seems to grow, not lessen, with the passage of time.

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My Opinion:

It's a love-hate thing with this novel. There were some really intriguing and intense scenes but there were also sections that bored me a lot.

Firstly, this book took me a while to get into. Around Part 2 was when I began to want to read on but up until then the story was just bearable.
Then, 3/4 of the way through part 2 I found myself getting very bored and actually skimming parts of the novel. There was just too much description and it was only describing the background to Oceania... I realise that the background did need to be explained but it lasted for too long.

However, there was a huge twist that I was no expecting at the end of this part which I guess makes up for the boring facts beforehand. The surprise was really successful and intrigued me a lot. Part 3 was definitely my favourite section because everything was wrapped up very nicely. I think the book ended very well and everything was explained.

The main thing I enjoyed was the creativity of the story line. I find it fascinating that someone can imagine this new and unique dystopia where everyone is hateful and horrid to each other. So much thinking and planning must have gone into creating this world it because it's mindblowing and so much detail has been included in the novel. There's even a section at the end which explains Newspeak!

I'm not really into Sci-Fi novels (if this counts as part of that genre) so I thought I'd give it a go and honestly it wasn't the genre that irritated me... So if one good thing came from this I know I'll be reading more from this genre!

When you think about it, this future George Orwell predicted has sort of come to existence. Camera's do watch our every move and there's so much war and, it may not be to the extent he believed, but it is evolving... I think people need to read this and experience the realisation I've just had about life and the future... Wow it's scary haha!

Although I did enjoy this book, it doesn't make me want to read anything else by him. I really enjoyed Animal Farm (review for that is here) but overall this wasn't as good. It was a more creative idea but more difficult to follow. I would recommend it to people who have the patience to bear with it or people who are a fan of Orwell's novels because it wasn't bad... just not my cup of tea:)

Favourite Quotes:

"We shall meet in a place where there is no darkness"

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He was a lonely ghost uttering a truth that nobody would ever hear

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There was no such thing as happiness

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We are the dead. Our only true life is in the future

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It's a little chunk of history that they've forgotten to alter. It's a message from a hundred years ago, if one knew how to read it

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War not only accomplishes the necessary destruction but accomplishes it in a psychologically acceptable way

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It was curious to think that the sky was the same for everybody

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Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four

 Rating ★★★ 

3 out of 5 stars 

 Next book I'm going to review:
If I stay by Gayle Forman