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Summary: A biased opinion, but a good one....
Review: Okay. Without being too cynical or anything, this book has just one major problem in my humble opinion: for those of us who could really give a hoot about botany, this guy writes far too much junk about what the trees and bushes and such look like. All throughout the book I found myself saying, "Okay, they're on a deserted island with lots of trees, bushes! I get it already! Shut up about the damn trees!" Seriously, it reads like this guy originally wrote a fifty page novel, and his editor or someone told him that it needed to be longer.
Rating: 
Summary: a good novel--probably won't alter your idea of the world
Review: Lord of the Flies is generally read by students new to high school being slammed in the face with the shorter works of English that have been revered by academics. Such an introduction will often sour the reader's interest; deflate their desire to pursue a discourse with the fragile reality the author has set up. To those who enjoyed it the text can sometimes grow to take on a biblical veracity, spawning a cult of appreciation by the more pretentious of the youngsters who feel as though they'd accomplished something by getting something out of it. This is the perception of Lord of the Flies today . . .When I was assigned to read this book in school for some reason I decided to skip it. Who cares, I think I got a B on the test, and we moved on to Of Mice and Men or Death of A Salesman. Nevertheless, I found myself searching out this book again years into the future, possibly inquiring into the past over something I felt I'd missed. The result? A strong, swift book, sometimes beautifully written. On occasion a point is overexplained into the discussions and mired by the efforts of young boys speaking with an Oxford Graduate Student dialect. In other words, it sometimes gets pretty dull. The unreality of their speech is irrelevent, mostly, if only because Golding usually uses this technique to explain much of what is going on. It is a fine book among a long list of fine books about isolation, exile, lonliness, acceptance, faith, hope and civilization. If the book hadn't been so overwhelmingly sub-referenced I likely would have never picked it up and missed out on an enjoyable and profound--but perhaps getting tired as you begin to age--interesting little book.
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Summary: Lord of the Flies Book Review
Review: Book Review of Lord of the Flies The thought of what you would do if you were stranded on a deserted has crossed almost every person's mind at one point or another. What if it was to happen to you? Would you know what to do to survive? Lord of the Flies by William Golding brings Golding's moral philosophy into an intriguing story of a group of boys crash landing on a deserted island. As the boys attempt to survive, new problems arise from the lack of society that force the boys back to the clutches of their natural instincts.
A group of British schoolboys crash land on an uninhabited island somewhere in the ocean. With the only adult on the plane being killed in the crash, the two oldest of the boys, Ralph and Jack, begin a power struggle to be the leader of the boys. Ralph begins his life on the island by trying to incorporate a democracy within the group of boys. The boys then vote for a leader and they almost unanimously choose Ralph. The boys show their wish for society by making some rules to abide by. From the moment Ralph was voted leader, Jack was always his rival, whether he showed it or not. To show his strength, Jack starts a group of hunters that savagely kill the wild pigs on the island. The younger children of the island have their own problem, dealing with the fear of "The Beastie" supposedly a giant snake this imaginary beast develops into a creature that all of the boys' fear. Little do they know how the once imaginary beast would affect their lives. After Ralph confronts Jack about his hunters acting savagely Jack is enraged and orders a re-vote for leader. Once again, Ralph is voted leader again and Jack leaves the tribe to form his own group. To add to the conflict between them, the rest of the boys split off into two groups following either Ralph or Jack as their leader. To the reader this starts off as being a childish game, but when children start getting killed it evolves into a deadly struggle for power between the groups.
This book is taught in almost every school system in the country giving a new perspective of human nature with its immense amount of symbolism throughout it. Depending on how you look at it the book can be broken down into different kinds of symbolism including human civilization, Freudian Psychology, and a religious allegory. As a reader, I personally saw the book as a vision of human civilization in which the island is a microcosm of the world. The main characters each represent an aspect of human society including human virtues, violence, civilization, intellect, and peace. Aside from the characters, key objects in the story also represent something on a higher term. In one reading it may not be possible to catch every symbol within the book, which may encourage you to read it more than once.
Everyone who reads this book should be able to find a way to relate it to the world today. One of the best things about this book is that the way someone interprets the symbols is different from the next person. The general audience of this book is high school students who were forced to read it for an assignment, I being one of them. But I believe this book can be enjoyable to anyone of almost any age if they have an open mind. In my opinion, one of the main reasons why a student wouldn't like this book would be because they were forced to read it, and didn't really read deeply to discover all of the hidden meanings. But if you are open minded and enjoy a good book I suggest reading the adventurous eye-opening book, Lord of the Flies by William Golding. Golding, William. Lord of the Flies. New York: The Berkley Publishing Group, 1954.
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Summary: A Great Suspense and Adventure Story
Review: The Lord of the Flies is a very good book. It may seem that it doesn't make a lot of sense at first but once you understand it is really quite good. Before the book begins a plane, with a group of young school kids, crashes in the middle of the ocean near an island. This has already occurred before the book begins. The book begins with a kid walking around the island trying to figure out were he is. His name is Ralph. He is an important kid in the book. While he is walking he finds another kid whose name is Piggy. Piggy and Ralph are two of the main characters.
Ralph and Piggy realize that they are on an island with no adults. Ralph decides that for them to have the best chances of survival they must find all of the people on the island. To do this he uses a conch shell to make a noise. The noise calls all of the kids towards him. There are several groups of kids and even a boys choir that comes to the meeting. The conch shell represents power and leadership to the kids. The kids form a working relationship and they live with each other for a while. Then something drastically changes.
This is a great book about how kids can take leadership and power. They were very organized while doing this but they still found a few set backs on their way. It also demonstrated how people can become very savage. This is one of my favorite books that I have read. I would recommend The Lord of the Flies to anyone that enjoys reading adventure and suspense novels.
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Summary: A modern classic; engrossing in every sense
Review: Lord of the Flies is one of the most brilliantly disturbing and terribly intriguing books I've ever read. Golding displays a gift of potraying darkness reminiscent of Conrad and even Euripides. The symbolism he uses is masterful. Very few writers would even think to use literal translations of Greek. Golding makes it the basis for an entire novel. The devil is in you and me, and Golding portrays this better than anybody else.
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Summary: Down with the Pork
Review: The Sticky actually enjoyed this book as it reminded him of a certain porky guy he knows that also deserved to suffer the same fate as the porky guy in the book. He was charmless, had no sense of humor and also spoke like a cartoon character....
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Summary: Weep your eyes out for human nature
Review: Golding mercilessly shows Homo "Sapiens" as it is. Savage,cruel,bent on his most elemental instincts. Jack is the beast who'll overwhwelm all our civil nature, because savagery is inborn in every one of us. Only Piggy's and Ralph's culture and ethics can save us. But can it? William Golding 's message leaves very little to hope. His book is a warning beacon to humanity. Let us hear it,lest we become like the unfortunate personae in this book!
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Summary: Evil Seed of Sin Debases Innocence
Review: After a plane full of schoolchildren escaping the horrors of post-atomic age Europe crash on a remote, hungle island, a series of debates, alliances, counteralliances, and hiearchies are established to create a rule of law and standards. However, once fear and psychological symbolism enters the picture, all is changes and this budding society of big-uns and little-uns, ranging from 6-12 year olds becomes encapsulated by an air of sadistic fog.
Centering around the three main characters of Ralph, the elected conch-wielding leader, Piggy, the smart logical analytical scientist in the making, and Jack the hunter-gatherer adventurer full of blood-gutting passionate zeil. With these forceful characters in tow a series of events sets off a power-struggle that eventually yields to the emotional, non-rational, jumpy aspect of the human flesh in the name of Jack and his paint covered warriors gaining logistical control of the Island. After two viscious and violent deaths set off by stressful paronoia centered around the chances of getting rescued, the necessity to hunt for survival, mysterious forces and animals inhabiting the island (actually a dead human crashed by parachute), and the need to have a source of fire (i.e. Piggy's glasses), the death of Simon, who became possessed by the Lord of the Flies, an analogy to the dark side of human's dementia, he is killed in a frenzy after taking cover and protection inside the parachute layer. Afterwards, once Piggy seeks to reclaim his stolen glasses he is killed by Roger, a devious mischief maker. In the end, they are saved by a captain whose astonished when they admit to the death of two of their peers. Just as the Heart of Darkness revealed the dark forces unleashed by economic and resourceful greed, the Lord of the Flies showcases how this could come about from attention hording 12 years olds seeking to assert their status as leader and autocratic figure.
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Summary: Unhappy, gloomy, disturbing, unreal and cruel
Review: The book is too simplistic - from page 1 you get that it is an extrapolation of a group of boys on an island onto a human society in the world. Also I was very disturbed by unnecessary elaborately depicted sufferings and deaths of children.
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Summary: Burn it! (in a good way)
Review: It has been years since I read this book but I remember that it is the book I hold the most emotional bond with. The characters touched the deepest recesses of my heart and held on. The strugles that Golding incorporates into this book are remarkable. They are realistic in the way that kids would possible go to such an extreme if a situation of isolation cropped up. I still want to burn the book, not out of hatred to the book, but out of anger toward Sam(or whoever it was I can't remember) who killed Piggy. I believe that it is a sign of a good book, when you WANT to destroy the book, not out of distaste with the writing or the idea, but out of distaste of the characters in the book, out of such a strong passion that you want to see the heroes enemies fail and not see the heroes fall. And Golding, with an excellent book does exactly that.
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