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My rating: 5 stars

Lena has escaped. She’s in the Wilds. She is free. There is only one downside: Alex is dead.
We follow along Lena’s journey past the fence and into the Wilds through two perspectives: “Then”: Days after escaping and leaving Alex behind, Lena wakes up in a dark and dingy room. She was rescued by some Invalids that live out in the wilds, Raven, Tack, and multiple others. She builds a new life with them, learning their ways and learning a few things about herself too. She learns what it’s like to live outside of the comforts of the city, or the regulation she grew up with and grew accustomed to. She learns what it is like to be attacked by the government, their bombs ruining everything you own.
“Now” is her other new life, in which she lives like Alex did, pretending to be cured in the city. Lena spends her time trying to blend in, attending DFA (Deliria-Free America) meetings in hopes of getting information. At a DFA rally, Lena’s job is to keep an eye on Julian Fineman, whose father is the founder of the DFA. Julian is quite important himself, too. And after the rally is interrupted by the Scavengers (Invalids who are, more or less, just like Lena and Raven and all of the others, but they want destruction, not revolution) Lena finds herself a lot closer to Julian Fineman than she would have ever predicted.
I was beyond excited to start reading this book. Lauren Oliver is one of my favorite authors, and I couldn’t wait to see what would happen in the next installment of Lena’s story. Every page brought something new along with it, and every chapter was a new adventure. I loved the new character additions, especially Raven. There are moments when her motifs are questioned, but her tough and spunky personality makes up for it. I also enjoyed Julian a lot, and I think there is so much more to him than he revealed to Lena. And although I loved the two alternating chapters, “then” and “now,” there never really was a part where “then” and “now” connected. It was never told how Lena got from “then” to “now,” which I was hoping for.
Remember how Delirium ended with a super dramatic cliffhanger? Expect no different from Pandemonium. This cliffhanger left me yelling and desperately wanting the next book. According to Oliver, the third book in the trilogy, called Requiem, is already written and is set to be published some time in 2013. I’m sure it will be worth the wait.