Book 5: Fahrenheit 451

Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 creates a dystopian future world, reminiscent of George Orwell's 1984, in which houses are fire-proof, and firemen exist to burn books (and often their owners, who refuse to live without them). In a world without books 'confusing' people, where each house's parlour contains a virtual 'family' and a one channel television, meaningful human interaction is practically non-existent. The resulting hedonistic society use violence as their only remaining outlet for self-expression and the concept 'ignorance is bliss' is being applied to almost every situation in life. As a result, the people are so brain-dead to any other possibilities of life that they do not realise how shallow and meaningless their existence truly is. Guy Montag starts the novel as one of the many, a fireman who never realised how truly unhappy he was until Clarisse McClellan, his teenage neighbour, appeared and disappeared so suddenly from his life, opening his eyes to the possibility of life being different.

Although there have been many novels written about a dystopian future of our planet, Bradbury's commanding prose brings a new perspective to the canon. The impact of Bradbury's message is augmented simply by his writing a book about a world without books. Books act as a metaphor for free self-expression and thinking for yourself, for arguing, having an opinion and the right of each individual to have a voice. Although there is no mention of a leader or ruler of the America depicted in Fahrenheit 451, the chaos that the world descends into without books reminds readers of acts committed under dictatorships.

More than sixty years after its original publication, many modern readers, living in a largely uncensored world, fail to appreciate the novel's contemporary significance, as a reaction against the book-burning that was rife in many wars of the early twentieth century. Despite this, the novel is entirely engaging, and the reader is transported into this catastrophic future, which serves as a warning against the consequences of impeding on free expression for future generations and their governments.

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Book 31: Salut Galarneau!

Quebecker Jacques Godbout's 1967 novel Salut Galarneau! is semi-autobiographical, produced as the diary of François Galarneau, a young Quebecker man who owns a hot dog stand but is striving to become a writer. Unfortunately, his father dies and his mother leaves for America, leaving him without any parental guidance, and his love life is a series of seemingly promisingly relationships that end badly. What follows is something of an existential crisis for François as he literally builds a wall around himself, debating the seeming incompatibility of living and writing. His solution is 'vécrire', a made-up verb which is a mix of the French verbs for to write (écrire) and to live (vivre), suggesting a hopeful and more positive future for François. The structure of the novel itself is rather bizarre, with no particular sense of chronology, as François recounts events from various points in his life in a sporadic manner, seemingly as they occur to him. Therefore, th...

Book 16: Before I Go To Sleep

S. J. Watson's thrilling debut Before I Go To Sleep is gripping from beginning to end; written from the perspective of Christine Lucas, a middle-aged woman with a rare form of amnesia that prevents her from retaining new memories each night when she falls asleep. Therefore, when she wakes up each day, she believes that she is in her early twenties or younger, and has no recollection of the room she has awoken in or who the man lying next to her is. Each morning the man tells her that he is her husband, Ben, that they live together in London and that she had a serious accident which caused her amnesia. However, Christine is seeing Dr Nash, a specialist neurologist, without Ben's knowledge, and starts to keep a diary on his advice. Following on from this, it soon becomes clear that Ben is lying to her, and 'DON'T TRUST BEN' is underlined on the journal's first page, although Christine struggles to establish his motives. Keeping the diary not only helps Christi...

Book 14: The Story of Beautiful Girl

Put simply, The Story of Beautiful Girl is absolutely beautiful. Inspired by the true story of 'John Doe no. 42', an intelligent deaf man who was institutionalised simply because he could not communicate, The Story of Beautiful Girl , tells the story of Homan (John Doe no. 42) and Lynnie, the eponymous Beautiful Girl who has severe developmental delays . The pair, who are very much in love, run away from the cruel and disgusting institution where they and their disabilities are hidden from public view. However, they are not just running away to escape from the horrors of the 'school' - Lynnie is heavily pregnant, but not with Homan's child, and cannot bear the thought of giving birth to her child in such a place. Fortunately, they find Martha, a retired and widowed schoolteacher who provides them with shelter and food. But their bliss does not last as officials catch up with them and Lynnie is taken back to the school, leaving Homan on the run and Martha a...

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