Review: Fahrenheit 451

I loved the concept behind this story, but sadly the delivered story fell fairly flat for me.

Firemen: those who burnt books. The story does go into why this profession even exists and it's even more intriguing.

But I really struggled with the book. It's a little over 100 pages and I felt like I was slogging the book after the first 1/4 of the story. I think the writing style also distracted me from the story too. I felt line nearly every sentence was laiden with a turn of phrase or clever simile - but the book is thick with this and it became very noticeable to the point of distraction.

The pace really threw me off too, it starts building up characters and before I know it, Montag is murdering his fire chief, battling murderous robot dogs, planting fake evidence against another fireman (and from what I could tell, a character we hadn't met) and then wondering off in the woods to meet the people who keep books in their heads.

It felt like there was a great story of a dystopia where happiness is swallowed up in a pill, potentially like Brave New World, but Fahrenheit 451, for me, falls way short of achieving that.

A shame. I really wanted to enjoy this story more.