Book Review: Divergent

Title: Divergent

Author: Veronica Roth

Genre: Young adult fiction, dystopian

Publisher: Haper Collins

Publication date: May 3, 2011

Synopsis: Beatrice "Tris" Prior has reached the fateful age of sixteen, the stage at which teenagers in Veronica Roth's dystopian Chicago must select which of five factions to join for life. Each faction represents a virtue: Candor, Abnegation, Dauntless, Amity, and Erudite. To the surprise of herself and her selfless Abnegation family, she chooses Dauntless, the path of courage. Her choice exposes her to the demanding, violent initiation rites of this group, but it also threatens to expose a personal secret that could place in mortal danger. Read more …

Review: Divergent by (22 year-old!! wtf?) Veronica Roth was my THIRD young-adult-dystopian-first-in-the-trilogy novel of 2011. I had been looking to recapture the feeling I had when I read The Hunger Games Trilogy in 2010, but had yet to find the novel that would do that. The first two books, Delirium by Lauren Oliver and Matched by Ally Condie, were good, but Divergent was definitely the most enjoyable of the three.   

Unlike the other two, the romantic relationship between Tris and Four was not the main aspect of the novel. Sure, who doesn’t love a good romance? But, for me anyways, it should very rarely be the primary focus of a novel. This is not because I don’t love a sweet relationship, but usually the relationship between characters is just not enough to drive the plot forward. This is why it was refreshing to see that the romantic relationship in Divergent was not the main focus.

I must admit though that I adored the relationship between Four and Tris. Still, in literature, we see female characters taking the back seat to the male protagonists in novels. Being saved by them, sexualized, and treated as weak. I LOVED that Tris and Four were equals, partners and neither treated the other as less or more, due to their sex. Four treated Tris like the strong female she was, never once underestimating her capabilities. There were even times where ‘traditional’ roles were reversed and Tris was the ‘stronger’ of the two. It was so referring to see this and made me love Four and respect Roth even more. Such a wonderful relationship was created in this novel, and all we can hope PRAY for is that she does not see it fit to introduce a love triangle in Insurgent.

Tris was a great strong female character, as I mentioned above. I completely respected her bravery and choice of leaving her family and being true to herself. So many great emotions and themes were explored in this novel, and I felt that Roth did a fantastic job with all of them. There were many different aspects to this novel – the initiation, Tris’ relationship with her family, Four, the Erudite, etc. The plot pacing was perfect and moved relatively quickly.

Although the world building in this novel was decent, I still had trouble fully believing in a society that would be split in this way. I cannot believe that a community would believe that this division would prevent war, and I don’t completely understand why everyone has their panties in such a bunch over the divergent. Hopefully this will be explored in the second novel.

Additionally, I don’t love when dystopian novels focus solely on one city. What has happened to the rest of North America? Are other cities organized in a similar manner? Are there other cities? I hope this is addressed as well in Insurgent. In addition to these unanswered questions, the only other problem I had with this novel was how fast Tris and Four fell in love. I feel that this is the trend with young adult novels at the moment, but I would like a few more days between, you know, the initial meeting and the risking of ones like for the other. Maybe it’s just me, or is this too much to ask?

Divergent,  filled my Hunger Games void and had me counting down the days till May 2012 (when the next instalment comes out). It was a fast paced novel, with an original plot, and likable characters. It was a great novel and I am anxiously awaiting Insurgent.     

Warning: If you are anywhere near the age of 22, you will feel like a total failure in life after reading Divergent. :)

You might also enjoy: Delirium by Lauren Oliver or (obviously) The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins 

My Rating: 4.5/5.0