It's no surprise that I have an affinity for dystopian societies, so when I came upon Divergent, penned by Veronica Roth, I wasted no time and jumped right in. Since it's a trilogy, I'll be reviewing each book and posting my thoughts every Sunday. Seeing as the movie premiered Friday night, it only seemed fitting I start today.
I'll start off by saying that despite everyone pitting them against each other, I found nothing in common between The Hunger Games & Divergent, other than the fact that they're both based in dystopian societies. I believe the only other similarity is the adrenaline crazed heroine who would risk her life for her loved one. Other than that, I see nothing.
Now, the book itself is, in my opinion, excellently written. I have a bad habit of putting down a book if I feel it's not doing it's job of keeping me hooked, no matter how good the book is, and with Divergent I wasn't going to put the book down, no.matter.what. Veronica Roth has an incredible ability of keeping the reader hooked, a vital quality in an author. I have to applaud her on a wonderfully written and thought out story. I instantly felt connected to the main character, Beatrice Prior, despite her initially prudish mannerisms. I was engaged in the story, and I found myself loving Dauntless, fearing Erudite and sympathising with Amity. The story took me to every corner of their tiny world, and it's for that reason that I fell in love with the book. It's usually hard for me to find myself totally within the story, as opposed to just reading it, so with Divergent, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself engrossed and deep within.
I found myself a huge fan of Divergent, and was pleasantly surprised by how well the book turned out. I honestly recommend it to anyone looking for an enthralling read, and I personally vouch for it.
Verdict: 5/5
Would I read it again? For sure.
Plot
*Spoiler Alert*The story itself, despite initially seeming complicated, is simple enough. Beatrice Prior lives in a society, dystopian, that is divided into five sections, or factions as they're referred to throughout the book. Each faction represents a characteristic, all five making for the perfect society. Since this is set in the future, it makes sense that the people within the city, which is the world as they know it, chose to analyse what factors made for the fall of our modern day societies. They came to the conclusion that five characteristics made for the downfall of humanity. Greed, dishonesty, ignorance, unkindness, and cowardice. Based on those five factors, they established five opposing factions, one for each flaw.
It sounds beyond complicated, but bear with me. For greed, they established Abnegation, for dishonesty, the established Candor. For ignorance, they had Erudite, for unkindness they had Amity, and for cowardice they had Dauntless. So now we have a society with five factions that stand for eradicating five characteristics that made for the fall of our society today. Which means, the City so far has no greed, no ignorance, no dishonesty, no unkindness, and no cowardice. Aside from these five factions, there are factionless individuals, those who do not belong to any one faction, and must resort to roaming the streets. These are the homeless people we know today.
The citizens of the City are divided within the five factions. They live within their factions, in compounds. For every faction, there are rules. If you live in Abnegation, you mustn't indulge in anything pleasurable. Nothing that could bring you gain is allowed. Mirrors are prohibited, as are any personal items, clothing is all grey, and hair is plain. In Erudite, knowledge is above all else. In Amity, one must always act with kindness. And so on, so you get how each faction goes to extreme measures in order to keep in place the value for which it stands.
Now, on a given day each year, every sixteen year old must participate in an aptitude test that will determine which faction they are best suited for, their home faction, or another one as deemed fit by the results of the test. They then decide if they want to make the move to none of the factions determined by the test, or if they want to stay at their current faction, with their family. The twist? If you leave, you don't get to look back. You lose the option to remain in contact with family, or anyone from the old faction. For all five factions, the rule is "Faction before family". Should you decide to leave a faction, you instantly become factionless.
Beatrice, our heroin, has lived in Abnegation her entire life, with her parents and brother. Prior to her aptitude test, she often daydreams about making the move to Dauntless, should the test present Dauntless as an option, yet her selfless nature keeps the thought at bay.
On the day of the aptitude test, Beatrice is put under a sedative of sorts, and is exposed to a simulation where she is put in serious situations. Her actions under the simulation determine what factions she is suited for. Now, because of her actions under the simulation, Beatrice is told by woman overseeing her test that the results were inclusive. Instead of fitting into one of two factions, Beatrice has an aptitude for *three* factions: Abnegation, Erudite, and Dauntless. The fact that her test results were inclusive means that she has the ability to manipulate her simulations, making her Divergent. She is told that she mustn't reveal her divergent nature to anyone, that it would put her in grave danger, and is sent on her way.
Beatrice decides to join Dauntless, much to her fathers chagrin, and is surprised to find that her extremely selfless, and anal about Abnegation, brother makes the change to Erudite. She introduces herself as Tris, and that is what she is addressed as throughout the book.
During her initiation into Dauntless, Tris makes a few friends, and enemies. One of the those she grows fond of is Four, her instructor during initiation. The initiates are told that the must pass the three stages of initiation before being accepted into Dauntless. The first stage is purely physical. Hand to hand combat, the use of guns, and knives. Tris manages to rank sixth.
The second stage revolves around simulations, much like those included in the aptitude test. Initiates are put into fear simulations, living scenarios similar to their worst fears, and are judged by how quickly they are able to calm down, thus ending the simulation. Because Tris is divergent, she has the ability become aware of, and manipulate her simulations, which is how Four figures out her divergent nature. Tris is placed first when it comes to the second stage of initiation, despite having a few enemies who at some point try and kill her.
The third stage, the fear landscape, gathers all an initiates fear in one simulation. During this stage, anybody placed under the simulation is aware that they are in a simulation, divergent or not. They're judged on how many fears they have, and how much time it takes them to overcome, and go through them all. At some point, Tris learns that Fours real name is Tobias, and that his nickname, Four, is derived from the fact that he only has four fears. He is also the son of the Abnegation representative in the government, Marcus. Tris learns that Four left Abnegation because of the nature of his fathers abuse.
It's here that I must explain how the government works in the City. There is a council, made up of people from Abnegation, that sort of governs. Abnegation because the factions selfless nature makes for perfect politicians. At some point during the story, an Erudite journalist Jeanine Mathews, in an effort to "dethrone"the Abnegation representatives in the government, attacks Marcus and makes it known that he was an abusive husband and father, surviving his late wife. She feels that the other factions should have some sort of voice in the government, and that's why she has been going afterr Abnegation in such a ruthless manner.
After Tris' third stage, the fear landscape, she, alongside everyone else, is injected with a new "tracking" serum, that supposedly only goes off when someone goes missing. She and Four express their feelings to one another. During the night right after the initiation ceremony, Tris is surprised to find her peers waking up in a sleepwalking state, all in a uniform manner, and because she is divergent, she is immune to whatever serum they were injected with, since it wasn't a tracking serum after all. She pretends to be one of the sleepwalking soldiers on their way to attack the Abnegation compound. Tris finds out that Tobias (Four) is divergent as well, and is therefore unaffected by the serum.
After trying to flee, they are made, as divergent, and are sent to Jeanine Mathews, who is the Erudite leader. Jeanine injects Four with an extremely heavy serum that has the ability to underwhelm divergence, and therefor Four is under a simulation, unaware of his actions and controlled by Jeanine. She then sends Tobias to the Dauntless control room to oversee the attacks, and sentences Tris to death. Tris finds herself trapped in a glass water tank that is filling up. Seconds before death, her Abnegation mother (who was originally Dauntless) breaks in and saves her. Before sacrificing herself in order for Tris to escape, and getting shot, and therefore killed, her mother confesses that she, too, is divergent. Tris kills Will, a friend and her best friends beau, as he was about to shoot her. Under the serum, Will wasn't aware of his actions.
She stumbles upon her brother and father, and they all head for the Dauntless compound. They run into simulated soldiers upon their arrival, and Tris' father also sacrifices himself in order to make way for her and Caleb to move forward. After a nail biting encounter with a heavily simulated Four, Tris manages to snap him out of it. They shut down the Erudite simulation from the Dauntless control room, and free their peers from their sleepwalking.
Tris, Four and a small group head to Amity, where any remaining Abnegation residents escaped to. Amity, which is beyond the City walls, is a long way from home.
End.