Showing posts with label Dystopian. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dystopian. Show all posts

Sunday, July 13, 2025

Animal Farm by George Orwell


Genre: animals, dystopian, fables 
Source: I own a copy

Some of our students read Animal Farm in their history class last year. I felt it was time I reread the book since I plan to teach it in my English class this year.  George Orwell gives us a book that on the surface seems like a simple book of animals rising up against their owner due to his cruel treatment. If you actually read and analyze the book it is a mirror of a totalitarian society. This was Orwell’s way of protesting.

We have the story of Mr. Jones, a drunk who doesn’t feed his animals when he is drunk, which is often. Before Old Major the head pig dies he tells the animals that humans are evil. They take what they want and they don’t produce anything. He tells them they need to ban together. He dies and that is what they do. Unfortunately Napoleon and Snowball are the smart pigs. They begin twisting Old Major’s ideas to benefit themselves.  You can see where this is heading.  Orwell has shown what happens when people, or animals like Napoleon do things for the “good” of the people/animals, then become power hungry.  I hope my students like this as much as I did rereading this.




Friday, January 17, 2025

Drawing Freedom by Felicia Ketcheson

 



Genre: Young Adult, Dystopian
Source:  I received a copy to facilitate my review. The opinions expressed here are my own.

This is the second book in this excellent series. Reading it reminded me of "The Hunger Games", and "The Giver" all rolled into one. Breel is a young girl  who managed to fight back against the President and his rules. The only thing she wanted to do was be free to draw. Unfortunately, anything you can think of that you do for fun would be a crime in her world. This second book gives us more background into the early years of President Tatum's rise from poverty to President of Lexum. We get to see how wicked and corrupt he has always been. 
This group of rebels have gone all out in their mission to take down the President. They have a new ally willing to help them. Clonis is President Tatum's only surviving brother. It is obvious he believes his brother needs to be taken out. Why?  Well you will need to read the book to find out why. Breel gets to use her drawing abilities to try   to persuade others to join their cause.  This is one of those books that will stick with you long after you have finished it. The tension in it is high to keep you reading. The only thing that makes me sad is that I will now have to wait for the next book to come out.  If you like dystopian books then you are going to love this one.