Insurgent (Divergent #2)

Oh man. This was EPIC. I didn’t think I would like a sophomore book as much as the first in a series, but that was not the case with Insurgent. Honestly, Insurgent blew me away. Gah.


To start with, Tris and Four… sigh. Four was as dreamy as ever, even if his willingness to ignore some key events clouded his judgment and treatment of others in this book. He was still swoon worthy. Of course, Tris is still kicking butt and taking names. She is one of the best heroines out there. She’s strong, brilliant, and flawed: A great bookish role model for teen readers. She proves you don’t have to be a bad ass all of the time to be brave and strong. But most importantly, she shows that you don’t have to be cruel to be respected. Her compassion for others is one of the things that make her so amazing.

I also enjoyed seeing some “old” characters reappear. They each had interesting roles that really helped develop the plot, which made this second installment so much more layered than Divergent. (and you know Divergent was great!) One of the things I liked the most about the plot was the timing. Insurgent picks up just days after Divergent ends. I loved that. I hate books that have this huge time gap that I have to fill in using my imagination. Insurgent picks up at a key point (just where you want it to pick up from) and keeps on moving. It never slows down! It is all action, all the time.


If you know me well enough, you know that I was an English Lit major in college. Although I love YA books (thanks to a YA lit class in college), I still adore the classics. When I read dystopian novels I can’t help but think of the original dystopians (think George Orwell). Any new dystopian worth their weight in salt should generate a Orwellian feel. I strongly feel if you can’t conjure that spirit in your novel, it’s not really a dystopian. Just sayin… Do I think Insurgent lives up to an Orwellian novel? You betcha. If you’re familiar with any of George Orwell’s books, you’ll find subtle reminders all throughout Insurgent. I, personally, loved that, but I can’t say much about what those reminders were because it would ruin the book.

I LOVED Divergent, so I couldn't wait to read Insurgent. The beginning of Insurgent was a bit slow. Tris kept going back and forth from trying to be strong and then being miserable and weak. I get that she had to go through a lot in Divergent, especially with what happened between her and Will and her losing her parents, but I got a bit tired of hearing her have emotional breakdowns.

Once the action really started, though, I was reading nonstop. The action is really what got me hooked in the first place. That and the Tris/Tobias love story. They're both still teenagers, but their relationship is at such a great level and i just LOVE IT.

Then comes the ending! I had an idea of what happened due to all of the hints left throughout the book, but just hearing it be said and what came after was still shocking.

Overall, I loved the book. It's great, though not as great as Divergent.

It took me forever to read this book but only because I didn’t want it to end. I drew it out as long as I could until I just couldn’t stand it anymore; then I devoured it over a couple days. ‘Insurgent’ is an awesome read that is full of adrenaline and emotion, and I loved every single minute of it, even the parts where I was going, ‘Nooo! Not that!’ or ‘Why?! WHY?!” There are some awesome twists and revelations in the book, a few tender but not overly sappy moments and some scenes of true wide-eyed horror. Tris is pushed to the edge as she recovers from the events that occurred at the end of ‘Divergent,’ and she sets out to find out why Erudite attacked Abnegation in the first place. She has to become an even stronger person to handle the situations she finds herself going through in ‘Insurgent.’

This sequel was just as good as the first, and it definitely succeeded in building upon the world that was created in ‘Divergent’. In 'Insurgent,' we get to see more of how Candor, Amity and Erudite work; I found Amity to be especially interesting in that they’re slightly cultish and take peacefulness to the extreme, so much that they drug their unruly members. Craziness. The reader is also exposed to the various Faction headquarters and given some insight into what it would take to be a member of Candor, Amity or Erudite. We also get to see the Factionless in this book, and I found myself sort of liking the group of outcasts, just a little bit. They’re a resilient, determined bunch, to say the least, led by someone I never would have expected.

The relationship between Tris and Tobias is one of my favorite aspects of 'Insurgent,' just as it was in 'Divergent'. I think they’re perfect for each other, but I love that they don’t have a wonderful, perky relationship. They have problems, doubts and arguments, but even when it seems like things between them can’t be reconciled, you know they’re eventually going to be together. And it’s wonderful. They fit one another too well to not belong with each other, and their personalities complement one another fantastically. Most of the time, I’m cynical about young love lasting, but for Tris and Tobias, I’m all for it. Also, I positively love how she hasn’t turned their relationship into a triangle. There is no Team So-and-So, and for that I am eternally grateful, Veronica Roth! Thank you!

'Insurgent' was an extremely satisfying read, but it also left off with a delicious cliffhanger that made me go, “WHAAAAT?!” and check the release date of the next book. Fall 2013, you cannot get here fast enough!

So, Insurgent came out about a month ago, and I feel so out of it since almost everyone else had read it before me. Even my friends who I recommended Divergent to, read Insurgent before I did. But, I’m extremely happy to finally be able to post a review about the epicness that is Insurgent!

Insurgent was an amazingly fast-paced, action-packed, suspense-filled read! I started reading it before going to bed, and ended up staying up till 2 a.m. finishing it. For some reason, no matter how hard I tried, I could not for the life of me put down Insurgent. I would tell myself that every chapter would be the last, yet I kept on turning the pages, consuming every word.

Oh, Tobias and Tris!

Still a bit annoyed with Tris but I'll get over it.

So I had problems with Divergent, not enough to make me hate the book or even only like it. I liked it a lot I just had problems and confusion. Like world building and over-arching plot and such. I knew when I started reading Insurgent it would either ruin the previous book or make it work and be incredible. I am glad to say that despite many annoyances Insurgent was the latter, it was awesome!

THE ENDING! GAH! That is all I have to say about the book. The ending made it happen. The book was an interesting, quick, and filled with action. But that was it. But the end! Now I need to read the next book. It is required for me to maintain my sanity! I can't wait!

However, despite how much I loved the ending there were a number of things that disappointed me about this sequel. Including but not limited to, the writing. It works for the book but it doesn't particularly appeal to me. It is just average, telling the story. I don't mind it too much but it is something that keeps it from being a favorite. I was also disappointed about how Peter developed. I wrote in my review for the first book how I would be interested in seeing him developed into a good guy, flawed but good. That didn't happen, he was put right back into his hateful character except for one tiny glimpse of goodness. Four also annoyed me in this book, a lot. He was just an annoying idiot to Tris for a majority of the book. There were a few other things but nothing worth mentioning. Just minor flaws and while they detracted from my love for the book they didn't detract enough to bother me.

Also, just thought that this had to be brought out. Tris was fabulous in this book, she was truly suffering for her decisions. I loved her for that. She was an idiot because of that sometimes, but I couldn't fault her for it because she was always written in character. Her stupid choices made sense for that.

Soundtrack: Heart of Courage by Two Steps from Hell (obviously this needed epic music!) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRLdhFVzqt4

Cover – I love it! Much better than Divergent's cover (which kept me from reading the book for a long time)I love Amity's symbol it is beautiful and the colors are gorgeous!

Note to everyone: this is not a book you want to stick at the bottom of you TBR pile. You should read it straight away!!!

Insurgent picks up directly where Divergent left off. It's almost like they're not two separate books at all, just different parts of the same book, because usually different books pick up a while after the first one left off, and there is something of a recap to what has happened. This didn't happen with Insurgent.

I think I liked Divergent more than Insurgent, but I still really loved Insurgent.

It really seemed that the real characters came out from under the hard shell they have on the outside. Every single one of them, in Insurgent we learn about how the characters really are.

Tris turned out to be a selfless person through and through, but she was a bit of a wreck after shooting Will (it happened in Divergent), maybe even overly so. But she got through it in the end, which is good.

In Insurgent, Tobias and Tris are having a couple of problems. Tris is just trying to do what she thinks is best for everyone (even if that means sacrificing herself) and Tobias, instead of trying to reason with her, spends a lot of their time together yelling at her, believing that she doesn't value her life. I kind of get where he's coming from, with that, but I also understand Tris' side of the story. Kind of strange. I like how they have these fights. Well, obviously I didn't LIKE it, but I think it was good because it let us know that they weren't some fairy-tale couple, where everything is always okay.

Grrr... I don't like cliff-hangers much. Veronica Roth is going to write another book right? I'd hate to be left hanging for the rest of my life, even though the cliff-hanger was really good, making it all mysterious and everything.

*As always, I try my best not to include any spoilers. But if you haven't read Divergent, you will find some spoilers for it in this review, and I found it was virtually impossible to review Insurgent without some minor spoilers for it.

Before I can properly review Insurgent, I must point out the following:

The first hurdle I had to overcome with Insurgent, and it was probably the biggest hurdle as it continued throughout the entire book, was that Insurgent picks up directly where Divergent left off. That means there is absolutely no recap, no reminder of who these characters are and why I should care about them or their current situation. I had read Roth's handy post But I read Divergent a YEAR Ago! prior to reading Insurgent, but while it mostly cleared up some of the confusion over who a character was, it didn't help me re-connect with any of the characters - which was something I remember having trouble with in Divergent anyways. I understand why Roth chose to withhold a recap, and a part of me even agrees with her, but it did make for some struggles throughout my reading experience when I was jolted out of the story as I found myself asking "who is this person again?".

My lack of connection/inability to remember certain characters was also one of the reasons I had a harder time believing any of Tris' angst over Will's death. She kept referring to him as one of her best friend's from initiation, and I couldn't help but scratch my head and ask "Really? Were they that close in Divergent?" because I just couldn't remember their relationship being so important to Tris. Add in her grief over her parents' death, and Tris is a complete emotional wreck. So I started wondering if Roth was making Tris overemotional about both Will and her parents' deaths because she felt she had to overcompensate for her lack of emotional response - to pretty much anything - in Divergent. (For anyone who is unaware, Roth wrote about the mistakes author's often make, and specifically mentions that Tris' sexual assault in Divergent played no part in her character development - which was a mistake.) So it was with these feelings that I continued reading Insurgent.

A huge, you might even say significant, change in Insurgent was it's focus. In Divergent, we bore witness to action scene after action scene, with Tris' romance with Four merely a side-plot that happened in the background, in-between action scenes. In Insurgent, those two roles have been completely flipped. Suddenly, Tris' relationship with Four...err, Tobias (because now that she knows his real name, it's an insult for her to call him Four?), has become front and centre, while everything else - the action scenes that were so crucial to Divergent's success, and the political turmoil and threat of war that loomed - have become the background, side-plot. Not what I was hoping for. Especially since Tris seems unable to open up to Four, so she spends much of her time worrying about their relationship and what Four will think if she does tell him the truth, and Four spends most of his time being emotionally unavailable and frankly, a jackass. Tris is the exact same person in Insurgent that she was in Divergent - she jumps head-first into any dangerous situation, without thinking through the consequences (at least, that's how I remember her). But suddenly, that type of reckless behaviour is a problem for Four, because he doesn't think Tris values her life. So instead of talking things out with her, he spends a lot of their time together yelling at her.

Unfortunately, this goes on for the majority of the book. I do have to say that I'm glad that Roth realized her mistakes in Divergent, and was working on rectifying them in Insurgent, but I think she went about it in completely the wrong way. Tris has suddenly lost her spark, her zest for life. Everything she does is motivated by her "selflessness", the thought that if someone has to die, it should be her and no one else. Except...that's not why she's suddenly so selfless. She doesn't care about dying because she's given up; she doesn't care what happens to her because she no longer cares about her life. And I understand why she would have a dark period that she has to fight to rise out of. I just don't think it should have been the framework with which Roth built Insurgent. I kept hoping that Tris would realize the value in living, rise out of her slump, and we would get some action to complement all the angst. I'm sorry to say that it just didn't happen until it was too late.

I'm not going to get in to how poorly I think the world-building in this series is, because I covered that in length in my review of Divergent. (Although I have to point out, Erudite wear glasses because they're intelligent? Really?!) I will point out that it didn't bother me so much in Insurgent. I'm not sure if it's because I had lower expectations going in, or because I knew the whole idea of factions was implausible so I was able to overlook/ignore it? I did find the plot had a few weak points/holes though. Like, how it was suggested that the Factionless would be of the utmost importance, only for them to make only minor appearances. Or how Tris was constantly turned to by her peers for advice or suggestions, only for someone else to remind us that she's barely sixteen. Or how Tris expresses pure hatred for Marcus and his treatment of Four, only for her to believe his claims over Four's adamance that he was lying. Or how Marcus knows the information contained in the file at Erudite headquarters, but is unwilling to share it with anyone and he still manages to convince people that it's worth recovering. And the ending! Ugh, the type of cliffhanger I hate: an entire book's worth of buildup, only to finally uncover the big secret just in time for the credits to roll.

Since this entire review has been me complaining about Insurgent, and where I think it failed, surprisingly I still enjoyed it. While Tris' angst began to annoy me, I did find myself unable to put down my book until I had read just one more chapter, which led to just one more chapter, which led to me finishing the book in almost one setting. So while I found myself confused about some characters, annoyed with others and questioning their motives or choices, I also found myself intrigued about the consequences. I still wouldn't say that I am truly invested in any of these characters - Four could be killed within the first page of book 3 and I wouldn't be overly upset - but I am interested in seeing what happens to them. I care enough to continue their journey, to see where they end up. And I'm looking forward to seeing what's beyond the fence.

***spoilers***

I don't even know where to begin. Even in the first book, the villains were completely one-dimensional, but it wasn't until reading INSURGENT when I realized that almost all of the secondary characters are total cardboard cut-outs. And while there are a lot of arguments and inter-character drama, most of it is cliche and/or ridiculous.

Oh, and the pseudoscience? I've already bitched about this in DIVERGENT, but INSURGENT takes it to a whole new level. The explanation of what "divergent" means was nonsensical enough in the first book, but INSURGENT tries to throw in a bunch of science to explain it, and guess what? It doesn't work. Sure, having a larger prefrontal cortex might make you more strong-willed or "goal-oriented," but how the f*** does that relate to having a more "flexible" personality? Oh, and now "divergent" is supposed to be a genetic thing. Yes, the ability to resist mind-controlling substances can now be passed down with a simple gene. Don't even get me started.

Actually, yes, please do get me started. Veronica Roth tries to make the science behind INSURGENT actually sound credible, but I'm convinced that she's done nothing more than look up "parts of the brain" on Wikipedia. While she might know what the prefrontal cortex does, she doesn't seem to grasp the fact that even the most basic science requires a certain degree of logic behind it. (But hey, if we're going to play "scientist," why not take it all the way? Like, for instance, if the members of Amity have been exposed to happy serum their entire lives, shouldn't they have built up some kind of tolerance to the substance? And how is it that Tris' society has found a way to manipulate the brain, the most complex organ in the human body, but they can't even cure spinal cord injury? Oh, and while we're talking about mind control, how exactly are they getting those microchips in the right part of the brain? Hell, how are they even getting them through the blood-brain barrier?)

And this is the part where you tell me to calm the f*** down, because Veronica Roth isn't a scientist, she's a writer, and she's doing her best. (After all, they call it science fiction for a reason.) And in most cases, I'd agree with you. I mean, it wasn't easy to swallow the sad excuse for "genetic engineering" in ACROSS THE UNIVERSE, but I let it slide.

So why am I being so harsh on Insurgent? Oh, don't I know. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that Roth is attempting to build ground with scientists while simultaneously turning them into the Big Villains. Yes, I'm talking about the members of Erudite, the faction of cold-hearted, overly-utilitarian mad scientists who are fascinated by water filtration systems and wear glasses not because they actually need them, but because they want to look smarter. Am I really supposed to believe that half of the intelligent faction is going to get behind an evil tyrant like Jeanine? Intelligent people tend to question things, and as a result, they're a lot harder to manipulate.

But anyway, I didn't have a problem with the "evil Erudite" in DIVERGENT. I love a good evil genius as much as anyone else. Unfortunately, the whole "genius" part doesn't seem to apply to Jeanine, the Erudite leader. Every one of her actions is dripping with stupidity. At one point, she wants to use a truth serum on Tris, but the leader of Candor won't let her have any of it, and it will take days to make a new batch. Umm, did it really never occur to her to keep an extra vial of the stuff hidden away before she gave it all to Candor? (It seems like a useful thing to have around.) And hiring a guy who previously deserted the Erudite/Dauntless alliance to guard one of her most important prisoners? (I was under the impression that she had a hundred other sociopathic minions she could have picked for the job.) Oh, and my favorite: "Abnegation has this big important secret thing that we want, so let's commit mass genocide in order to steal it!" (Did it never occur to her to just, I don't know, pull the fire alarm or something?)

I fell in love with this book just as I fell in love with Divergent. . . This is . . . totally MIND-BLOWING and BREATHTAKING. . . I loved it. . . and I still do. . . Tobias and Tris. . . Perfect!