Divergent (Divergent #1)

I loved this book so much that I've both read it, and listened to the audiobook version. Some books are just meant to be read. This book, on the other hand, is one of those rare pieces of work that could go either way.

This book had been in my "To-Read" pile for almost a year before I took the time to pick it up. Let me tell you, I REALLY wish I had no waited that long. I loved the book!

The story follows Beatrice, as she starts her journey as an initiate in her new faction, Dauntless. She has to struggle for her life and fight for the lives of her family and friends; all while she tries to uncover the deadly truth of what it means to be labeled Divergent. If you are a fan of The Hunger Games, then definitely take the time to read this, you'll be intrigued by the relationship between Tris and Four.

I read Divergent a year ago, and I was waiting for Instrugent to come out. But when it actually came out, I realised I had to read Divergent again. And I am very glad that I did. This book is a dystopian that changes you. There is not a lot of books that I can compare this amazing book to. It is very different to a lot of other dystopian books that I have read. Because of the factions and what the purposes of the factions are, make this book very unique.

When sixteen-year old Tris makes her choice, she cannot foresee how drastically her will change. Or that the perfect society in which she lives is about to unfold into a dystopian world of electrifying decisions, stunning consequences, heartbreaking betrayals, and unexpected romance. One choice decides your friends, defines your beliefs and determines your loyalties...forever.

Divergent is a brilliant, heart-pounding debut that cannot be missed by anyone!! This is a book at it's best and is near impossible to beat. Everything about it will simply blow your breath away, change your mind, and make you scream until your voice is hoarse. The choice of reading this book will transform you forever.

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Divergent is the first book in a trilogy by Veronica Roth. The setting is a future dystopian Chicago, where the city - and presumably the country (although nothing much is ever said about the world outside of Chicago) - have been split into five factions according to personality:

Abnegation (the selfless)
Amity (the kind)
Candor (the honest)
Dauntless (the brave)
Erudite (the intellectual)

All children are given an aptitude test when they are 16 to determine which faction they are best suited for. Then, in a public ceremony, they choose a faction for life. If the faction is different than the one they were raised in, bye-bye family ("faction before blood" is their motto).

Those who fail to assimilate into their chosen faction are the factionless, doomed to live in the projects and take the "undesirable" jobs (like janitors and sanitation workers). Ouch.

The narrator of Divergent is Beatrice, or "Tris," as she prefers to be called once she leaves her Abnegation family to join the daredevil Dauntless faction. Her aptitude test results were inconclusive, ruling out only Amity and Candor, and making her "Divergent" - something that she doesn't understand, but is told is something she must keep secret if she wants to live.

After deciding that she isn't selfless enough and that her inner monologue is too snarky to really belong in Abnegation, and never really considering Erudite at all, Tris begins initiation into the Dauntless faction, most of which consists of jumping on and off of moving trains, hallucinating her worst fears, and hurling herself from great heights. She bonds with her fellow transfer initiates (all of whom are either from Candor or Erudite), develops a crush on her 18-year-old instructor, and gets beaten up a lot.

Eventually, Tris' Divergent nature starts to help her excel in her training -- a little too much. She is warned repeatedly -- with little to no explanation -- to keep her Divergency hidden. And ultimately, through some shoehorned monologuing by the Bad Guy, we learn why it upsets the Powers that Be so much for her to be running around, Divergent. Unfortunately, by the time she learns the truth, it may be too late...

Plot contrivances aside, I really enjoyed this book. No, I don't think the factions were explained well, and I don't believe a lot of the rules of the world makes sense. But I was able to suspend my disbelief enough to immerse myself in Tris' POV, and when you just accept that everything in her world makes sense (even though it doesn't), it's an enjoyable read. I'm hoping that some of the more practical questions about the world, why it exists, and how it functions are answered in the next book in the series, Insurgent.

I also hope to see Tris a bit more well-rounded in the next books. She is remarkably self-absorbed, suspicious, and unforgiving in her treatment of others. Even though she was supposed to have equal aptitude for Abnegation, Dauntless and Erudite, I didn't see many selfless or intellectual traits in her (she figured a couple simple things out using her wits, but the Erudite are supposed to be the exceedingly intelligent, not just the not-stupid). It's a puzzle, considering she spent the first 16 years of her life among the Abnegation.

This book isn't perfect. The characters were sometimes confusing. Sometimes infuriating. Some of the plot twists really come out of left field, and others you can see coming miles away. There are gaping holes in some of the logic. And the world building is extremely under-developed.

All that said, I still enjoyed it. It's fast-paced, it's entertaining, and it's escapist. It was a fun way to spend a couple afternoons, and I'm looking forward to finding out what comes next in Insurgent.

I love this book. A lot. I started and finished it in the same day. I completely got sidetracked from anything considered "important" (homework, eating, etc.)and read this fantastic book instead. It's well worth the hunger and procrastinated, messy work. I have a weakness for books told in a future/dystopian society, so the time setting alone drew me to Divergent.
In the future city of Chicago, every 16 year old must choose a "faction" to belong to- Candor, Dauntless, Erudite, Abnegation, and Amity. They can either stay in the faction they were raised in or switch to another. Once in a faction, you're there for life. You must base your entire mindset on the characteristics of each faction. For example, with the Candor faction, the members must try to obtain full honesty and impartiality. By grouping in factions, the theory is that altogether they will reach peace, even through differences, as long as each does their own share and they respect each other.
The main character, Tris, is a 16 year old girl that's truly relatable. She feels all emotions and has the characteristics that someone from reality may have. Veronica Roth created a perfect character that anyone can understand. The other characters have their own distinct and creative personalities as well, which I love. I felt like I actually knew Tris while I was reading it.
So, Veronica Roth can write well. Really well. She can create characters beautifully. She can tell a creative story. She did her research and made sure every detail was perfect- up to the definition of every important word. And she knows how to continue the story without boring the reader to death. Divergent deserves a full five stars. Read the book. You won't be disappointed.

Awesome!

Initially, after all the hype buzzing around Divergent, I thought it might be another disappointment.

But, I was totally wrong! This is one of the rare books that I finish in one sitting.

Divergent does not kick off with a promising first chapter. The explanation for each of the five factions seem lacking and slightly illogical.

However, I have to point out that Divergent's success and popularity lies in Veronica Roth's wonderful characterization and stunning storyline.

Beatrice is a real character who is really selfish and mean at times, and she knows it. She is constantly thinking about where she really belongs. She grew up in Abnegation which values selflessness above all, but she has never found it easy to be selfless like those around her. During her aptitude test, Beatrice is classified as Divergent, a dangerous category that her examiner helps to hide.

What is Divergent? Simply a term to describe those who belong to more than one faction, a mind that cannot be as easily controlled as others who tend to lean towards one of the values.

In the Choosing Ceremony, Beatrice chooses Dauntless to the disbelief and anger of her father. Her brother, Caleb, chooses Erudite for intelligence and pursuit of knowledge. Abnegation youths are not inclined to change factions, with only one-- son of Marcus (leader of Abnegation), Tobias, who went to the Dauntless.

This is the turning point of the story, the part which propells Divergent from one of those faceless dystopian novels to a first-class action-packed tale. As the story unfolds into the trials and challenges of initiation, the novel takes no effort to read at all, as one scene smoothly transits into the next. Most importantly, Tris (she changes her name for a new start) really grows. The character growth is spectacular! She becomes really bodacious (badass *coughs*) but not those type of brazen and arrogant ones who keeps making mistakes.

And here comes the best part of the whole book-- Four who must be one of the best boy-character-in-a-book ever! I absolutely loved him! A big THANK YOU to Veronica Roth for having no love triangles. Even then, the love between them is striking! Four has a sense of stillness to him plus a quirky sense of ; he is good-looking though his looks are not mentioned much in the book. The best thing about him is how treats Tris: not tortured, pained or anything, but straightforward, like they are equals, though initially wary. There's a sense of mystery around him until it is revealed at the end that he is Tobias, from Abnegation as well, and he is Divergent like Tris.

Divergent ends as war breaks out. (not revealing anything yet, go read it yourself, save you the pleasure!)

And it's a good ending because we know that Insurgent (Book #2) will start head-on with the action and the climax, can't wait!

Divergent is an action-packed read that also exploits some of human's most vulnerable sins and shortcomings. And as we see the people with power live in fear of losing it, as we see Tris slowly understand that real bravery is ordinary-- the courage that drives one person to stand up for another-- and not that different from selflessness, Divergent becomes more than just an entertaining dystopian story, but one that really highlight and illustrate to you the human weaknesses. Then we see Tris grow up and it's like a beautiful coming-of-age tale.

Sometimes, it's the characters and what the story really teaches you that is important, not that much of the world-building. Because after all, quoting Stephen King, Fiction is just the truth inside the lie.

Simply stunning. That's all I can say for one of my favourite books of 2011.

Roth has caught me completely in this debut novel of hers. . . I can't wait for the next installment. She is epic. . . I LOVE FOUR!!!!

I loved Roth's dystopian novel, especially its Heroine. Beatrice Prior of Abnegation steps into the simulation room to find out which faction she belongs to. . . She is frightened about her results and she should be. She's a Divergent, she has the qualities of Abnegation, Erudite and Dauntless, from here she is perplexed. How will she choose? She ends up choosing Dauntless, the braves. Finds herself in reckless and unbelievable heights of danger, in a few weeks she has now control over fear, not actually fearless but in control. She ranks first in the initiation. This is quite spoiling the people who haven't read it yet, anyway the book is AH MAY ZING! You've got to grab a copy!

Put simply: I love this book. I stayed up way too early in to the morning to finish it, I reread it obsessively for the entire summer, I recommended it to all my friends, and I have been dying to get my hands on the sequel.

That said, I feel like my rating for this book should be a little higher, but I cannot honestly give a better rating with the criteria YABC requires me to grade a book by. So let me explain.

The writing style. It really was not anything special. Just a normal, first person POV. It doesn't warrant a five-star rating for writing style, nor do I want to bring my overall rating lower by giving it three stars. Therefore, four stars it is.

Characters. Beatrice, or Tris, as she renames herself, is an amazing, brave character. Not fearless of course, but she's also not afraid of her fears. She's gutsy, but constantly underrated, and she's nowhere near perfect. While I really loved Tris, I would find it perfectly understandable if anybody wasn't too fond of her as a character. Oh, and Four (who, yes, is a character) is awesome. I don't know how else to put it; he's brave, kind of angry, mysterious (well, maybe he's mysterious; it took about a minute for me to guess his "secret" sort of thing), and I love the relationship that blooms between him and Tris - nothing TOO sudden (read: they do not fall in love with each other as soon as they look at each other), but complicated and passionate and, overall, unique. So why did I take one star off for characters? There's just not enough of everyone else. The minor characters feel either one-dimensional, or they're not given enough screen time for me to totally care. I felt like I should've cried at one point in this book (don't ask, this is spoiler-free!), but I didn't know anything or have any reason to feel like Tris did at that moment.


And finally, plot. A lot of YA books these days are very taken over by the romance aspect, even though blurbs and summaries advertise otherwise. This is not one of those books that makes the romance the main point, nor does it seem like the romance is simply a subplot. It's too front and center to be a subplot, but it cannot be considered the main plot, either. There is a very fine balance between the romance and the overall plot, one that I very much enjoyed. Aside from the romance, the plot was intense, exciting, adventurous, fun... barely a dull or calm moment. Veronica Roth is great at intricate world-building. It might start off a bit slow, but that is purposeful. Afterwards, you feel everything Tris does - fear, excitement, indignation, bravery. The book focuses mainly on three of the factions (Abnegation, or selflessness; Dauntless, or bravery; and Erudite, or intelligent), leaving out the other two. This is a good thing, because you are not overwhelmed and it leaves much more room to build on the intricacy and complexities of each of the three factions that are focused on. The other two could be explored in the next book (because yes, this is another trilogy). Conclusion: Awesome, action-packed book that leaves you always wanting to know what happens next and impossible to put down.

I highly recommend this book for people who like: dystopian, romance, adventure, action, YA books in general.

Also, isn't the cover awesome? :)

rly good book.