Karissa E. (ophelia99) reviewed on 5/31/2012 + 2527 more book reviews

This is the second book in the Divergent trilogy by Roth; the third book is still untitled at this time and will be released in 2013. This was an absolutely fantastic follow-up to Divergent. Although not as ground-breaking it does a good job of throwing some new twists at the reader.

Tris is still reeling from the events that happened at the end of Divergent. She is trying to cope with the loss of her mother, killing Will, and a multitude of other issues. The factions are broken and trying to take sides. Tris and company are trying to prevent the Eudites from attacking more factions, while at the same time trying to figure out who is right and what is really going on.

This book is hard to describe for me because I just got so completely sucked into the story. There is something about Roths writing that made it impossible for me to stop reading this book...I just keep turning pages. I ended up reading this in a little over a day; it was such an easy and fun book to read.

To be honest I didnt like this quite as much as Divergent, but then I would have given Divergent 10 stars if I could. Where Divergent introduced a really neat dystopian concept, this book was more about dealing with the aftermath of a society thats falling apart.

Tris is a wonderful character. She makes mistakes, but she is just so resilient. She is pushed to the breaking point both emotionally and physically in this book and yet still she survives. Four is back as well and features in much of the story. He is another great character, although there are parts of his personality that are hard to like in this book.

I really enjoyed watching all of the different factions mix. They learn to tolerate each others habits and/or preferences; you can also see all of the characters learning to respect the strengths of each faction and how each faction is necessary for society to work as a whole.

I didnt enjoy Tris and Fours lying to each other. They both want to be in a relationship but their constant lying to each other gets old quick. They recognize the problem, but never seem to make much headway on it. When Fours mom enters the story (and wow is she something) things get even worse. We do get a lot of background on Four and his family in this book as well which helped to add more depth to his character.

The story around the Divergent and the effort to explain the Divergent state more, is very interesting and made for good reading. There are some super awesome surprises and twists at the end of the story; they caught me by surprise and were really intriguing.

As with the previous book this is a super engaging and fast-paced read. There are a ton of very well done action scenes and the storyline never stops; seriously the pace of this book will leave you feeling breathless at times.

Overall an absolutely wonderful continuation of this series. I loved watching the factions merge and loved how they were forced to work together. I love Tris and how she is such a survivor. I didnt enjoy her and Fours relationship as much in this book; there just isnt much trust between them. I loved some of the twists and turns. Roths writing absolutely pulls you into the story, the action is non-stop, and the book is super hard to put down. Highly recommended for fans of action-packed dystopian reads.

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