Divergent by Veronica Roth

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I normally limit myself to reading Amazon’s Best Books lists, but was intrigued when I saw this book on the Goodreads best book list (with over 10,000 votes) but not in Amazon’s.

I confess that I couldn’t put the book down and urged everyone in our house to read Divergent. The novel starts strong with a selection process second only to Benedict Society’s in cleverness. Ms. Roth’s dystopian world was fleshed out fairly well — five factions (Dauntless, Erudite, Abnegation, Candor and Amity), their respective customs and how they relate to each other were very clear cut, but not stereotypical enough to become predictable.

Obviously, I am well above the target age demographic for this book, so I suppose my attention span is long enough to notice the sudden abbreviation of various story arcs in the plot. I wish I knew more about the motivations and history of the supporting characters (Triz’ Mom, Al, Cristina). I loved the twists regarding Triz’ mother, Caleb and Al but I wanted more of the backstory. For example – Triz’ mom is not what she seems! Then that arc suddenly ends in the next chapter! What the? The love angle with Four was also resolved a little bit too early for my taste (there is nothing like UnResolved Sexual Tension (URST) to propel a story line).

Definitely this book is a lightweight compared to The Hunger Games (Katniss is still my role model!) but fun to read nevertheless. T read this book in a sitting but promptly forgot about it the next day when she started reading the Mortal Instruments saga.

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