A Creative Exploration and Analysis of Contemporary Dystopian Fiction

What makes a dystopian fiction so popular? What creates a memorable opening? More importantly, what are the conventions of dystopian fiction? There is now an increasing number of scholarly works that explore contemporary dystopian fiction. It has become apparent that dystopian fiction today seems to target a specific audience, namely young adults. Besides the more obvious reasons for the stereotypical anti-social teen interest in doom and despair, there lies a more important message, both politically and spiritually. So then, if you are to write a dystopian novel of your own, what are the guidelines for the novel to be both successfully dystopian and successfully inspirational to the young adults who are bound to stumble upon it? This paper looks at the way popular dystopian novels of the decade have made an impact and moves on to explore the beginnings of contemporary dystopian novels, before finally concluding on how effective these guidelines are for future use.