A Title for a Post that I'm not sure how to Name

Good morning everybody! I have completely adjusted to the new schedule (FINALLY!!!) and I hope everybody is enjoying this class (I certainly am).

While I was reading this week, I noticed that my book (in case you don't know or forgot, it is called Incarceron) gives me a lot of information that I have to infer off of to understand how society is set up and how the book is structured. It's fairly similar to the way Ray Bradbury presents a lot of information at one time in Fahrenheit 451. I had to keep rereading passages in both books to make sure that I fully understood what was going on in the book, and I had to pay close attention to the set up for the next event in the book.

Not only did the author of Incarceron include a lot of information in the beginning pages of the book, but she also places quotes at the beginning of each new chapter. These quotes are from books within the book, or the books that the characters in the book have read. These book quotes are not from real books, but made up books that give the story more structure and backgroud information. This is a little confusing-but trust me, it makes total sense if you were to see the layout of the book. For example, this quote begins chapter 14, which is when Claudia learns more details about the prison and the way life is in The Realm (where she lives), "We forbid the growth and therefore decay. Ambition, and therefore despair. Because each is only the warped reflection of the other. Above all, Time is forbidden. From now on nothing will change. -King Endor's Decree" (Fisher, 112). What I think is especially interesting is the fact that Time is capitalized, though it is mid sentence. This happens with other words like escape. It's as if, in the prison and society, the words are not concepts but rather things or names.

And another thing that I really like is that from each chapter there is always one quote that sticks out. This isn't the same as the book quote that begins and sets up each chapter, but it is one or two lines found within the text of the story that burn into your memory and continue to stay there until it is brought up again in a different way. One quote that really stuck in my mind was when Claudia is talking to her future husband, who she absolutely hates, " 'Caspar, listen to yourself! Have you ever thought about what sort of life we'll have together, in that marble mausoleum you call a palace? Living a lie, a pretense, keeping false smiles on our faces, wearing clothes from a time that never existed, posing and preening and aping manners that should only be in books? Have you ever thought about that...Have you never wanted to be free, Caspar? To be able to ride out alone one spring morning  and set off to see the world? To find adventure and someone you can love?' " (Fisher, 113).

I'm not sure if the quote stayed in my mind. Was it because of the character, Claudia, who I absolutely adore? Or was it because of the morals of the statement that are so close to my own? Or is it because it's ironic that she lives outside of a prison, yet she feels just as trapped as a prisoner? I really like this quote and I think the author could be foreshadowing to something Claudia may do to escape her own life. It also has an underlying message about freedom that I'm sure will play a large role in the theme of the book.

Okay, so that sums up this week (WOW I wrote A LOT), and I'm pretty sure some of you gave up and just skipped to the part where I ask a question and you respond in the comments. But for everybody who read the whole post, I give you a pat on the back and a high five. Congratulations! So my question for you is why do you think that Fahrenheit 451 and Incarceron are so similar in the way they are structured? And why and how does an author do this effectively? I think I know the answers to these questions, and hopefully I gave some of my ideas (no matter how faint they may seem) above in my post! Thanks for reading and have a good week!