William Golding, Lord of the Flies Review

Overall Rating

It has been just over half a century since Golding first published this book, so maybe it's a good time to take another look at it. I promise to dive deep and to explore the effects of William Golding's extraordinary imagination.

In the book, some young boys are stranded on a small empty island, all is fine until tension builds between some of the main characters and the mood on the island changes, to a disturbing and dark atmosphere. A huge contrast between the sun-drenched island to a sinister nightmare. Golding creates a shockingly chilling place where personalities clash and young boys fear for their lives. The young boys must cope with no food, no parents and no shelters or way to get home. They imagine a black beast and leave it a pig's head in the silence, but is the beast an animal or something else? Ralph focuses on the fire and rescue, while Jack isolates his tribe and commits himself to the hunting of the beast, when they killed the pig they would brutally stab at it's body and horrendous weeps and sounds would emerge from it.

The book includes breath-taking, violent twists and turns. There are fast-paced scenes and places where you cannot put the book down, with a mysterious character that is unnoticeable till the early end and the extremely violent and barbaric killings.

One of the main themes running through the book is that we humans need authority; mankind would fall apart without leadership and rules. This book shows it well that people need someone to look up to and to keep them on the straight and narrow.

Beelzebub is a Hebrew word which means literally "Lord of the flies", also Beelzebub means devil so the book has a hidden meaning and shows dark passages will be included in the book. It would be recommended that you read this book for a thrill; it's a good book for anyone to read but sometimes drags on but has a storyline which engages the reader and depicts scenes that can disturb. It is quite action packed with some edge of your seats points. It's a four star book which excites the mind.