Book Cover
Title Divergent
Author Veronica Roth
Cover Art Joel Tippie
Publisher Katherine Tegen Books - 2011
First Printing Katherine Tegen Books - 2011
Book Cover
Title Insurgent
Author Veronica Roth
Cover Art Joel Tippie
Publisher Katherine Tegen Books - 2012
First Printing Katherine Tegen Books - 2012
Book Cover
Title Allegiant
Author Veronica Roth
Cover Art Joel Tippie
Publisher Katherine Tegen Books - 2013
First Printing Katherine Tegen Books - 2013
Book Cover
Title Four
Author Veronica Roth
Cover Art Joel Tippie
Publisher Katherine Tegen Books - 2014
First Printing Katherine Tegen Books - 2014
Category Dystopia
Warnings None
Main Characters Beatrice Prior, Four, Uriah, Christina, Caleb, Marcus
Main Elements Dystopia
Website veronicarothbooks.com




Click to read the summaryDivergent

Click to read the summaryInsurgent

Click to read the summaryAllegiant

Click to read the summaryFour




Two books in I'm scratching my head a little as to why this was so popular, but I do that a lot for most female aimed young adult fiction. The first book just left me confused, I mean what a weird society. How is it that there are people who always tell the truth but not smart, or smart but not friendly, friendly but not brave, brave but not sefless? And why are the friendly people the farmers, what has one got to do with the other? Where did all these one-dimensional personalities come from and to find someone who is smart, brave and selfless is considered Divergent? Aren't everyone made up of several aspects, qualities and faults? And why isn't there a group for funny people, running the entertainment perhaps? And it's very strict, once you fail to make it into one faction you can't even try for another, you just become factionless which means you live in the streets and surive off the generosity of others. Why, why, why? Why create a society with a huge number of homeless, jobless, helpless people built into the system?

There's your expected romance, the slightly bad boy who everyone else is scared of but our heroine is able to look past his gruff exterior and access his sweet and loving interior. And our heroine is as expected, never good enough for the boy, she's too flawed, how could he possibly love her given what she's done, she's so worthless, might as well sacrifice her life since the world would be better without her...sigh. So while I kind of liked Four, Tris was just annoying, though Four had his annoying moments too.

Now, with the society setup being so weird, I hoped there was a good reason for it, and as we get to the end of the second book there are hints that this is indeed the case, which would explain a whole lot. But the explanation is not very clear yet, so guess I'll have to read the third book after all. I'll keep reading to figure out the worldbuilding, not because I really care what happens to the characters.



Finished the trilogy...the last book jumped between the POV of Tris and Four which was...disconcerting at best. Since I was used to just seeing Tris' POV when I was reading Four's I would think it was her and then find it really weird. And, well, I wasn't convinced by the underlying premise of the story (which I won't spoil here), I didn't feel it was very realistic, though swap in some other kind of oppression (racial, religious, ethnic, etc) then I can view this as a kind of allegory. But I don't think the science behind the book really holds, even the memory serum...I can't see it wiping a personality, their memories, but not their ability to read. All our experiences are learned whether it is a skill or an emotion and I doubt you could wipe someone's name (which they learned since their parent taught it to them) while not wiping what they learned in school. I know there are things we feel we learn from a book versus we learn simply by experiencing life, but they are just two ways of absorbing the same information. Ok now I sound like an Erudite...

Well, for what it's worth, it was full of action and mystery and kept be going because I wanted to figure out what exactly was going on in this weird place. I was a bit disappointed by the answer but it's still a valid dystopia tale, and if you're into difficult romances and heroines that attempt to be strong (while still being annoying at times), basically your classic YA directed at teenage girls, then I'm sure you'll enjoy it. I didn't hate it, I've read far worse, but I just didn't get they hype. Anyway, I have the movies on my PVR and will give them a go.




Posted: January 2020

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