Monday, June 27, 2011

Divergent by Veronica Roth

Title: Divergent
Author: Veronica Roth
Publisher: HarperCollins Children's Books
Acquired: From publisher for an honest review
Age Group: Young Adult
Grade: 97% or A+

In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue—Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is—she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself.

During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles to determine who her friends really are—and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes infuriating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers a growing conflict that threatens to unravel her seemingly perfect society, she also learns that her secret might help her save those she loves . . . or it might destroy her.

My Thoughts:
This book sat on my shelf much longer than it should have. I was afraid to read it. There is just so so so much hype for this book right now and I thought that reading it would just leave me disappointed, which is what happens when things don't live up to the hype. But I couldn't resist for very long and decided to take the plunge.....and wow. This is like..the book of the year.

Let me just start out by saying that Divergent did something that is hard to come by nowadays. Divergent was the perfect lead up to a trilogy, but also had plenty going on. Too many times now I find books that are a part of a series or trilogy or whatever, and NOTHING HAPPENS. Or at least not until the very end. Fortunately PLENTY happened in this book, with promises of more in the next one.

Dystopian is the way to go for authors right now, which is perfect for me since it is my favorite genre. Roth pulls it all together perfectly. The whole concept of how this world works is amazing and very creative. I would love to have seen more about the history and reasons behind the current ways of living, but I'm sure we'll get more of that in the upcoming books.

Beatrice, or Tris, was a wonderful main character. I could easily sympathize with her confusion about what being Divergent means and the even deeper confusion about why it is so dangerous. The book did a good job of teaching us about the other factions even though the focus was mainly put on 2 or 3 of them. This is done by Tris getting to know other characters within those less talked about factions. I really liked these other characters even though they didn't play a large role. It is nice to see an author take such care in the details.

Overall I very much enjoyed this read and regret not picking it up as soon as I got it. I'd recommend this book to anyone who enjoys the genre or needs a Hunger Games replacement.

1 comment:

Katja said...

Really something I should get around to read. Don't think I've yet read any negative reviews about this book.