Insurgent by Veronica Roth

One choice can transform you—or it can destroy you. But every choice has consequences, and as unrest surges in the factions all around her, Tris Prior must continue trying to save those she loves—and herself—while grappling with haunting questions of grief and forgiveness, identity and loyalty, politics and love.

Tris's initiation day should have been marked by celebration and victory with her chosen faction; instead, the day ended with unspeakable horrors. War now looms as conflict between the factions and their ideologies grows. And in times of war, sides must be chosen, secrets will emerge, and choices will become even more irrevocable—and even more powerful. Transformed by her own decisions but also by haunting grief and guilt, radical new discoveries, and shifting relationships, Tris must fully embrace her Divergence, even if she does not know what she may lose by doing so.

      Insurgent takes place immediately after the conclusion to Divergent, leaving the narrator, Tris, feeling hopeless and lost in the remains of the world she's always known. 

      This installation of the series is just as dynamic and excited as the first, though in very different ways. The first focuses on the drama and danger of making it through initiation, while the danger is much more prevalent in this book as Tris, Tobias, and the other left-over Dauntless struggle just to find a place to collect their thoughts. They are constantly being followed and attacked by Jeanine Matthews and the other sadists at Erudite, and it's difficult to determine who they can trust and who they can't.

     The inclusion of the factionless as high contenders in the "new world order" creates a really cool and dramatic dynamic between the other factions, Tris, and especially Tobias, and the tension is constantly running very high. Couple that with the various reactions of this "war" by the factions Amity and Candor, both of which Tris spends time in under "sanctuary," there's a lot of political tension running through this book. 

     Another thing that was VERY prevalent in this novel was Tris's inner drama and conflict with her emotions. Insurgent was a lot darker than the first book because Tris was constantly battling with her guilt over killing her good friend, as well as the guilt of doubting Tobias and being unsure if her feelings for him are as strong as his for her. The pressure of keeping her guilt secret from those around her threatens to crush her more often than not, and especially later in the book, she has a lot of self-sacrificing, almost suicidal thoughts. This was not what I was expecting from Tris, especially when her guilt refuses to let her hold a gun to protect herself and those around her.

Things That I Liked:

1. I loved the inner conflict with Tris and her darker emotions. While I don't think every YA reader is in the right place to read this sort of conflict from a "children's" book, I think that kind of conflict is very real and intense, and gives the story a whole new level of depth.
2.  The Tobias-Marcus-Evelyn drama saga is pretty interesting, and instead of frustrating, it's actually enjoyable to see Tris kind of immediately hate Evelyn for Tobias, and just always hate Marcus but know that he's got something she wants. This aspect of the story also allows the reader to know that Tris is a reliable narrator because she is not just following around her boyfriend, she is thinking for herself and trusting her instincts, which are always attractive traits in a main character.
3. emotions.
4. THE SECRET.

Things That I Did Not Like:

1. THE SECRET ENDING
2. Tris's utter lack of concern for her life/clearly not thinking about the consequences her actions could make on those around her. We learned in the last book and relearn a few times in Insurgent that Tris is not dumb, that she usually thinks through her decisions. But she rushes into a lot of stupid things in this book and it's very frustrating to see her self-destructive behavior and have the only person pointing it out be Tobias. The second frustrating part of this is that Tobias is only pointing out her flaw and not TRYING TO HELP HER because giving her ultimatums is NOT HELPING.
3. The faction jumping. By going around to all of the different factions for help, the reader is submitted to lots of new surroundings and lots of new characters to remember, and it gets very confusing who we like and don't like by the end of the book.
4. emotions.

Overall Impression:

      I seriously enjoyed this book, possibly more so than its predecessor (large gap time in reading notwithstanding). It was dynamic, dramatic, and intense, and yet the storyline wasn't complicated, despite all those D's. It is an engrossing read, one of those "you are no longer my friend-this book is all the social nourishment i need" kind of books. I got to the end, turned the page and made this kind of face:

because I couldn't believe it ended where it did.

Not happy.

The Blonde's Rating: 4.5 of 5

Goodreads Rating: 4.3 of 5

Amazon.com Buyers Rating: 4.6 of 5

Go read this book. Also, Divergent was pretty cool, too.

Thanks!

The Blonde

Divergent by Veronica Roth

     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.

     I've been hearing a lot about this book in the YA-reader circles and there are lots of reviews raving about it, so I decided I wanted check out what all the buzz was about. And needless to say, I had HIGH expectations for this book because of all of the hype surrounding the book and the upcoming film adaption.

     And guess what...it lived up to my expectations.

     I will admit, it started out sort of slow, and I sort of had to force myself to keep reading for the first couple of chapters, but sometime around when Tris changes her name and moves to the Dauntless camp, I found it difficult to put the book down. Before I realized it, I was engrossed in this story, and the writing was incredibly well done and the story steadily became more dramatic, exciting, and enticing. It's easy to see (after finishing the book) why so many people are excited for the final installment, to be released in October.

Things That I Liked:

1. I really liked Four. He has the greatest personality, and I love his veiled interest in Tris, although there was a point, like, two pages after meeting him where I said to myself "he's that kid that was abused by the Abnegation leader."

2. The action; the story was narrated in Tris's head, but because she is an action-oriented character, there isn't a lot of long thought-passages of her trying to make a decision or thinking about her situation.

3. The fear landscape/simulations were a really cool idea, and I totally didn't see the use of them coming up in the end-scheme of the big turning point in the book. I thought it was a really interesting use of the simulation and it really makes the reader think about morality and the owner of the responsibility of people's actions.

4. Tris's struggle with "becoming" Dauntless but being unable to be completely Abnegation. It felt real and relatable, and I really admired how she handled her issues.

Things That I Didn't Like:

1. Peter is a b*tch. But he is a good villain, I guess.

2. Eric. I know nothing about him except that I was supposed to hate him and indeed I did.

3. Is there, like, a history, or some kind of origin story for how the factions came to be? Like, it's obvious this supposed to be a dystopian version of Chicago, but how did Chicago as we know it now get to the point it is in during Divergent? What's going on in the rest of the world?

4. It would be really cool to know what exactly it means to be Divergent, because from what I can tell, it just means that you are indecisive and can actually think for yourself.

Overall Impression:

     This was a really interesting novel, and I'm really excited to see where things go from the end of the first book. It's clear that the next two books are going to be very different from the first one, so it will be interesting to see if the style can stay the same.

The Blonde's Rating: 4/5

Amazon Rating: 4.6/5

Goodreads Rating: 4.3/5

To read the review for Insurgent, click here.

Thanks,

The Blonde