Divergent - Veronica Roth - UPDATED REVIEW

Divergent by Veronica Roth
Genre: YA Dystopian

Blurb (on back of book): In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago world, 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 alongside her fellow initiates to live out the choice they have made. Together they must undergo extreme physical tests of endurance and intense psychological simulations, some with devastating consequences. As initiation transforms them all, Tris must determine who her friends really are—and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes exasperating 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 unrest and growing conflict that threaten to unravel her seemingly perfect society, she also learns that her secret might help her save those she loves . . . or it might destroy her.

old review

UPDATED REVIEW
MY OPINION: **

This was my third time reading this book and my rating is substantially lower. I honestly didn't even remember that I had read this book twice before. I only remember reading it years and years ago in elementary school but I apparently read it in 2017 and liked it. Huh. It's strange that I just don't remember that ever happening.

In 2017, I said I liked it less than I had in 2014. The same is true now: I liked it considerably less than I did in 2017. Maybe I've grown past the YA dystopian novels since I don't seem to like a lot of the famous ones that everyone loves, or maybe I just didn't like this particular book. I don't think I've ever finished this series because I never get past the second one for some reason, but this year is the time to finally do it.

thoughts I want to share:

-The writing style was not my favorite. I read this out loud with my sister, us taking turns reading the dialogue and descriptions and we died laughing at some parts because of how... "cringe-worthy" it was. It was very... young-sounding. It sounds like my eighth-grade self, which is coincidentally when I last read this book. I'm not saying I could write a full-length dystopian novel like this but some of the basic sentence structure felt very loose and basic.

-Four. I died laughing at everything Four said and did. I've seen the film dozens of times because I used to like it when I was younger and I could only imagine Theo James's face doing all the things that Four was doing in the book. Aside from that, I liked Four's character but some of the things he said were hilarious. I feel like he kept trying to put on a tough-guy act when he really wasn't. There were also times when he was quite rude to Tris with no explanation.

-Tris. I liked how she had character development throughout the book but her entire character annoyed me. She kept repeating herself again and again like "I don't belong here but I also don't belong there... No! I am Dauntless! I WILL BE DAUNTLESS!" This book obviously went by the dystopian trope of a conformed society with the main character being different from the rest and thus making him or her a threat. The old me apparently loved Tris but my entire opinion of her changed this time around.

-There was something sincerely wrong with Peter, Molly, and Drew. They had severe superiority complexes, especially Peter. He couldn't stand it if someone ranked higher than him and literally took to TORTURING SOMEONE so that he could be first.

-I hated how they vilified the Erudite. The entire book felt vaguely prejudiced against certain factions and I didn't like that. The Erudite may have some cruel leaders but that doesn't mean that you should hate all of Erudite. Tris even goes as far as to blame WILL, her FRIEND, who came from Erudite.

-Christina and Will were so cute. SPOILER I'm so sad that he died. END SPOILER

-Al deserved better. That's all I'm going to say.

The book was so unnecessarily long. There were so many parts that could have been cut out and it would have been better. My favorite scene was the Ferris wheel scene because I was dying of laughter every time they interacted.

I would recommend this book to readers looking for a young adult dystopian series with a strong female protagonist.

Main Character: Tris
Sidekick(s): Four, Christina, Will, Al, etc
Villain(s): Eric, Peter, Molly, Drew, Erudite, etc

Dystopian Elements: This book was set in a futuristic world.