Review: Fahrenheit 451

Purchase Fahrenheit 451 here.

Synopsis:

Guy Montag is a fireman. In his world, where television rules and literature is on the brink of extinction, firemen start fires rather than put them out. His job is to destroy the most illegal of commodities, the printed book, along with the houses in which they are hidden.
Montag never questions the destruction and ruin his actions produce, returning each day to his bland life and wife, Mildred, who spends all day with her television “family.” But then he meets an eccentric young neighbor, Clarisse, who introduces him to a past where people didn’t live in fear and to a present where one sees the world through the ideas in books instead of the mindless chatter of television.
When Mildred attempts suicide and Clarisse suddenly disappears, Montag begins to question everything he has ever known. He starts hiding books in his home, and when his pilfering is discovered, the fireman has to run for his life.

Review:

I've been kind of devouring dystopian novels lately (many more reviews to come, so brace yourselves), and I thought it high time to read one of the classics.  I've been told I would enjoy Fahrenheit 451 multiple times, and I've owned a copy for some time now.  The set-up for this book is intriguing, and it's recently become more and more of a cautionary tale as authors battle censorship and book bans for the smallest of reasons.  In addition,  as someone who's often absorbed in Tumblr and has spent the majority of the past 6 or so years immersed in social media, Mildred's character is incredibly relevant.  In addition, this novel had some of the most poetic prose out of any dystopians I've ever read.  To be fair, I did occasionally get lost in it, and I was left hoping for much more at the end of the novel.  And Clarisse!  I was expecting her to be such a big character, and I wanted her to be so badly!  Despite a few misgivings, this is an incredibly important book and I'm glad I included it in my list of dystopian novels to read.

Until next time, happy reading!
-Amanda