A plane crashes on an uninhabited island & the only survivors a group of schoolboys assemble on the beach & wait to be rescued By day they inhabit a land of bright fantastic birds & dark blue seas but at night their dreams are haunted by the image of a terrifying beast In this his first novel William Golding gave the traditional adventure story an ironic devastating twist The boys' delicate sense of order fades & their childish fears are transformed into something deeper & more primitive Their games take on a horrible significance & before long the well-behaved party of schoolboys has turned into a tribe of faceless murderous savages First published in 1954 Lord of the Flies is now recognized as a classic one of the most celebrated of all modern novels