Delirium

Delirium is a dystopian young adult novel by Lauren Oliver, published in 2011 by HarperCollins under its HarperTeen division, and the first of a trilogy.

The society of the novel has decided that love is a disease to be prevented: at eighteen, everybody is required to have the Cure, and the operation is presented as a kindness that leaves people safe, calm and predictable. Lena Haloway has watched love destroy her mother and has no intention of repeating the mistake, so she is counting down the days until her own treatment. With ninety-five days left, she meets Alex, a boy who comes from the Wilds and lives outside the government's reach. The novel follows what happens as the rules she has accepted her whole life become questions rather than facts, and it does so in a country where the authorities watch for exactly this kind of deviation.

Oliver writes romance and suspense at the same speed, and the trilogy continues the story of Lena's choices and their consequences. The novel is also a story about a young woman discovering how much of her own character was decided before she was old enough to argue with it.