Pandemonium by Lauren Oliver

The Synopsis:
I'm pushing aside the memory of my nightmare,
pushing aside thoughts of Alex,
pushing aside thoughts of Hana and my old school,
push,
push,
push,
like Raven taught me to do.
The old life is dead.
But the old Lena is dead too.
I buried her.
I left her beyond a fence,
behind a wall of smoke and flame.
Lauren Oliver delivers an electrifying follow-up to her acclaimed New York Times bestseller, Delirium. This riveting, brilliant novel crackles with the fire of fierce defiance, forbidden romance, and the sparks of a revolution about to ignite.




My Thoughts:
Lauren Oliver has to have one of the best writing styles I've ever read.  It's absolutely gorgeous.  It's melodic and lyrical, sending my thoughts into an entirely different world. She sucks me in and refuses to let me put down her books until I'm finished.  Her writing is a book nerd's heaven.  Also, must I mention her amazing imagery skillz?  Yes, she's got skillz.  The imagery was so beautiful that it made me want to make a shrine for it.

I wasn't sure if I liked Lena in Delirium, but after I finished reading Pandemonium, there is no doubt in my mind that she is one of my favorite YA heroines.  She is strong, but she does have her doubts and she can get scared.  She is not stone, but she no longer is the Lena from Delirium.  She does not show her pain, and instead of wallowing around, she moves forward.  She pushes herself to her limits and she doesn't back down.  She is afraid, yes, but she's got the momentum now to look over that fear and do something about the corrupted government that lives beyond the Wilds.  She is the Resistance.

I thought it was very interesting how Oliver wrote this book.  She had alternating chapters, but they weren't in different POVs.  It was still Lena throughout the book, but there's the Then and Now chapters.  It wasn't confusing at all and the idea was so original and answered a lot of questions while creating a lot of suspense.

The ending, I thought, was a little predictable, but it left me with a very "WHY YOU DO THIS TO ME?!?!" feeling.  A better word for that, I guess, would be frustrating.  If you've been hanging around my blog, you might have noticed that I used Requiem, the last installment to the series, for my Waiting on Wednesday post last week.  I want to read Requiem so badly.  So very badly.

If you haven't picked up this series yet, I suggest you do because WTF is wrong with you?  Why have you not picked up this book and experienced the adventure I have and other readers have been on?  If you have read this book, or at least read Delirium, then you must at least understand on some level why I so adamantly suggest others read these books.

Pandemonium is an emotional and heartbreaking tale about lost love, forbidden love, vengeance, and the bad guys.  There's violence, corruption, and evil all mixed in with a heart-warming romance.  Your feelings will be torn and you won't be able to put this one down.