Winston Smith is an excellent member of the Outer Party: he's a dutiful civil servant, able to rewrite news releases and revise older reports to match the current political climate. Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia; why would anyone think differently? Winston is pretty skilled with the Newspeak, but he has a secret: he is a rebel, engaging in Thoughtcrime regularly. Winston writes the revisionist histories but he does not believe them; he remembers evidence of the earlier truths and cannot bring himself to accept the Party's reinventions. He is not alone: finding Julia gives him an outlet, the knowledge that he's not alone in his thoughtcrime, in his distrust of Big Brother and the Party and newspeak and everything else that goes along with their world. They have their love affair and eventually get caught; from there it's the horrors of Winston's reeducation at the hands of the Party, until Winston is confessing to everything and nothing and betraying everyone he's ever known. 
 Unquestionably dystopian: totalitarianism, nationalism, thought control, revisionist history. Classic usually encountered in high school classes; upper high-school students and adults will appreciate it most. 
 Readalikes: Fahrenheit 451 for hoarding of old-world artifacts; Candor for brainwashing, Brave New World and Delirium for forbidden romances and emotionless, government-mandated pairings.