The Divergent Trilogy

This is my review on the first two books of the Divergent Trilogy:

I'll start out by giving a quick background story: I've always liked writing ever since I was a kid, but I was never much of a reader until I started to read the books I liked. I read Hunger Games and Divergent, and then everything changed. I began to read much more, and I began to love it, just as I do now.

Divergent was a really special book for me because I loved the structure of the book, and the characters were great! The character, in particular: "Four"--Tris's love interest--was written so well by the very talented Veronica Roth, and I fell in love with him too! Somehow, while reading it, I didn't really notice how depressing most of the ideas were. This was the same with Hunger Games. I just focused on all of the light and magical things about the book. So, obviously, it surprised me when I re-read it to find that it was quite sad.

Regardless of this, it was a fantastic first book. Everything about it fit together perfectly with a great amount of twist and turns and juicy characters. When the second book came out, I was still a bit dazed from the magical, lighter qualities from the first book, and I was seriously surprised when I found that it wasn't light at all.

Insurgent, the second book, has a great plot, and some seriously realistic character interactions (such as Four and Tris fights--although I was sad to see so many of them). That being said, I also thought that the way that Tris's bravery became her simply not caring about her own life anymore was a little sad. It is hard to hear things from a narrator who has lost some of her voice and emotion because she's been numbed by her parents' death. It is realistic that she might have that quality about her for a while, but having the entire book be in a voice that is so quick to chose everything dangerous is a little irritating.

I DO think that it makes for an interesting character, but I saw much more life in Tris in the first book than I did in the second. She went through a wide range of emotions that was very realistic for her age. What really irritated me most of all beyond the way she was so quick to hurt herself in Insurgent was the way she hurt others. Since she didn't think of herself as good enough, or worthy enough to be alive anymore (since her parents had died), she constantly lied to Four. I understand that sometimes it was necessary in the circumstance to lie, but EVERY SINGLE TIME that they made up from their recent fight, she would ruin things again.

I think its important to go through stages of loving and hating the main characters of the books you read, but constantly hating them just isn't satisfying. I also really dislike those moments in books where the narrator says something along the lines of, "I really wanted to tell him the truth, but I just couldn't." If you wanted to tell him the truth, just do it! In almost all of the Y.A. books, when the main character doesn't tell the truth, whoever he/she is lying to becomes furious and offended. I think its important to have conflict, but not such an overwhelming amount that you can't see the good anymore.

With all of that being said, here is my rating:
Divergent receives 4.5 out of 5 stars.
Insurgent receives 3 out of 5 stars.

Thanks for reading!

-Julia

My blog

My name is Julia, and I love books! This blog is dedicated to my opinions on books (and sometimes movies). I hope you enjoy it!