Julia: A Novel

Who can take a masterpiece like the dystopian novel 1984 and update it, retell it, and make it true to the original while bringing a totally different perspective to the story? Well, this reader believes that it would take a masterful storyteller and great writer to complete this impossible task. Sandra Newman manages this feat by pushing us through the most compelling horror story imaginable albeit with strong parallels to modern political life. In our real world of “alternate facts,” it is not a great leap to double-talk and doublethink.

In this retelling, it is Julia Worthing rather than Winston Smith who is the main character and the focus of the story. The author creates a heroine with a blank aspect who is nonetheless riveting as she moves through her proscribed life and work. The author wrote the book that none of us want to read, yet we are drawn by her craft into turning pages of horror to seek a resolution and relief from the unrelenting anti-utopia.