Book Eight: Insurgent

Insurgent

By: Veronica Roth

I finally got my hands on a copy of Insurgent and time to read it!  This weekend was a wonderful combination of no homework and no grading.  I loved Divergent and was looking forward to this book and it did not disappoint!  

The characters in this series are well written and unique.  I found each of them relational in their own way.  Beatrice's internal struggle is engrossing.  The reader is pulling for her to overcome her trauma induced failings, while at the same time relived that the trauma was enough to induce such a phobia.  There are massive amounts of character growth in both Tris and Four, but I found the development in both Christina and Peter most interesting.  There is nothing better than a series where even the secondary and minor characters grow.

Recommendations:
Like Divergent I recommend this book to any young adult readers who enjoy sci fi.  The writing is smooth and easy to read.  I would expect readers of all ability within the genre to enjoy with novel.  This book is similar to Hunger games with teens fighting for what the believe in crossed with Uglies sterile world set in black and white.

Stars:
9 out of 10

Break Time

My semester has taken off and my reading time has gone down to nothing.  Between grading papers, teaching, and keeping up on the classes I'm taking I've had little time for reading (the life of a grad student is difficult).  I happened to find a few minutes for myself today and thought I'd recommend the best book I've read so far this year and the book I've already read and suggest for other's reading list this year.

Best book this year:

Divergent by Veronica Roth

I cannot wait for Insurgent, I had to order it since none of my local bookstores had it in stock.

Similar books:

Hunger Games, Uglies, Leviathan, and Host

Book I've already read but recommend:

The Host by Stephanie Meyers

With the movie coming out there is precious little time to read this book before the internet is full of spoilers.  I know the Twilight series have a bad reputation, but Host is a different book and I enjoyed it.

Book Four

Divergent by Veronica Roth

I absolutely loved this book!  I've been looking forward to this one since I took on the 50 book challenge and I was not disappointed.  I'm a huge fan of the more subtle sci fi novels and this book fits that description perfectly.  Veronica Roth portrays a creative futuristic society without slamming the fact that the setting is futuristic in the readers face every page.  The author explained that the technology is different without forcing the reader to endure pages and pages of technical description.  

The strong focus on characters and Beatrice's struggle to find where she belongs in a strongly delineated world makes the book extremely relatable especially to teens who often live in a confusing world delineated by cliques and schools that want them to choose a course of study that will dictate their foreseeable future.  Roth captures the struggle with belonging when everyone else seems to fit in without any trouble at all perfectly through Beatrice's eyes.  

Recommendations: 

I strongly recommend this book to anyone!  Especially anyone who enjoys YA sci fi.  This well written and perfectly paced book keeps the reader engaged every second until the reader is surprised to find they've read the entire book in one day.  The fast pace and easy to understand characters lead me to recommend the book to even week young adult readers.

Readers who enjoyed Hunger Games and/or Harry Potter will love this book.

Stars: 

11 out of 10!!