Imagine a world led by a terrible dictator, where the choices of an individual are limited and every decision is grounded in fear.
Of course, such a thing could never happen in today’s society. What madness! Particularly in democratic societies, people would never vote for megalomaniacs whose ideology resembles Hitler’s. Unthinkable!
So we must turn to fiction to see the darkness within. YA dystopian fiction became more popular with The Hunger Games, but it certainly wasn’t the first title to ally adolescent rebellion with wider societal change. Here are some of the best dystopian titles for young people . . . .
The Declaration trilogy by Gemma Malley offers up a rare non-American take on a dystopian future, focusing on a world where immortality is possible – once you don't have any children. The sense of being a misunderstood teenager is amplified to the max in a world where most people are over a hundred.
How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff is set a handful of years into the future, in which "The Enemy" attacks Britain and a young American must cope with the fallout.
The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins must be mentioned – noteworthy not just for the action-packed scenes once heroine Katniss is in "the arena" but also for its astute criticism of capital cities obsessed with fashion while apathetic towards the people suffering for it.
The Matched trilogy by Ally Condie posits a world in which only a hundred poems have been saved, and in which the government takes an unusual amount of interest in the love lives of teenagers. The third volume is particularly sharp on the tension between oppressors and those who come next.
The Birthmarked trilogy by Caragh O'Brien is possibly the most underrated trilogy of all time. Beautifully written and characterised, the series explores the life of a teenage midwife in a world where babies must be taken from their mothers to satisfy the elites, all for valid scientific reasons.
The Lone City trilogy by Amy Ewing, beginning with The Jewel, is often pitched as dystopian even though it is fantasy. Teenage girls are assigned to Royal Houses on the basis of their looks and fertility. It doesn't end well.
Veronica Roth's Divergent trilogy explores a world in which, Potter-style, every teenager is assigned to a particular faction. When the meek Tris chooses the dangerous Dauntless as her faction, all hell breaks loose.
Delirium by Lauren Oliver – like so many, the first in a trilogy – presents a world in which love and sexual attraction are categorised as pathological.
Glory O'Brien's History of the Future by AS King shows us snippets of a world in which things have gone horribly wrong, particularly for women. For some reason it seems oddly prescient.
Claire Hennessy is a writer, editor and creative writing facilitator
