• Hardcover: 448 pages
• Publisher: Harper Collins (February 1, 2011)
• List Price: $17.99 US
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 9780061726828
• ISBN-13: 978-0061726828
• Book obtained: via NetGalley for review

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Ninety-five days, and then I’ll be safe. I wonder whether the procedure will hurt. I want to get it over with. It’s hard to be patient. It’s hard not to be afraid while I’m still uncured, though so far the deliria hasn’t touched me yet. Still, I worry. They say that in the old days, love drove people to madness. The deadliest of all deadly things: It kills you both when you have it and when you don’t.

As I read Delirium, I was pulled into the beauty of such an original story of forbidden love. I mean literally forbidden by freaking law. It’s genius.

It’s pretty rare for a book to feel predictable and still keep me engrossed, but Delirium did that. From the very beginning, I thought I had the whole thing figured out. Not many surprises came my way, but the way Oliver told the story was so beautiful and heartfelt and tragic that I couldn’t put it down. If Lena follows the path she’s chosen, she gets the life she planned for—one that proves she isn’t diseased or suicidal, a life of contentment—she gives up the love she’s found with Alex. But if she chooses Alex, she gives up her life, her friends, her family—including poor, little Grace (the cousin she loves like a sister). No matter what she chooses, she loses something.

But beyond the very intense internal conflict, the real treat for me was watching the romance bloom between Lena and Alex. There was no rush…even though with Lena’s impending birthday, there could have been. They met with no promises of forever, just enjoying and savoring each moment they had together. This is no school-kid crush or fast-burning adolescent lust, it’s a love story, and it’s played out so the reader gets to feel the panic and exhilaration of the first secret rendezvous, the first kiss, the whole experience of first and true love.

The predictability was a little bit of a downer for me, but as I said, not so much that I didn’t enjoy the book. I would have liked to have seen some sort larger sense of character development outside the love story. In most ways, the way characters started the story is the same way they were at the end, and with the cast so strictly divided between those on Lena and Alex’s side and those not, I wish I could have seen some indication that people really felt bad about what happened to them.  Because the cure only removed the ability to love, it very much left intact other strong emotions like hatred, so I missed the shades of gray in the secondary characters.

I wish I’d realized going in that Delirium was not a stand-alone but rather part of a series (a trilogy I believe), as it would have prepared me more for the ending. Yes, the ending was the one surprise for me, mainly because I thought it was the end and all I could think was “Damn, Shakespeare would be proud.” What that means is while Delirium is a love story, it isn’t really a romance. There is no happily-ever-after. There’s not even really a happy-for-now.

What there is, however, is a beautiful story of the kind of love that can happen for young people if it’s only given the chance. And that’s worth the price of admission.

*Disclaimer: As a writer myself, I only review books that in my opinion are worth your time as a reader (meaning 4-5 stars). If I don’t think it deserves that, I keep my trap shut.*