Having
recently spent a lot of Oscar-related time at the cinema and thus having seen
the trailer for Insurgent multiple
times, I’m finally jumping on the Divergent
bandwagon. It was only a matter of time –
I love dystopian fiction, smart YA series, and compelling female protagonists,
and this book hits several sweet spots.
(Some spoilers – it’s simply unavoidable.)
It’s
not a dystopian novel without a completely jacked-up society, and in Divergent, we have a post-apocalyptic
Chicago populated by five factions allegedly installed to prevent a repeat of
the devastating wars of the past. The
members of Abnegation, Dauntless, Erudite, Candor, and Amity each follow
certain guidelines and traditions based on their self-evident virtue of choice,
and every young person’s life leads up to their aptitude test, which tells them
the faction they naturally align with, and the choosing ceremony, in which they
decide if they want to remain with their home faction or transfer to another. Beatrice Prior has tried to uphold the
selfless principles of Abnegation, but she’s always felt out of place in her
faction. Their ways don’t come naturally
to her, she’s drawn to the reckless lives of the Dauntless, and try as she
might, she can’t quiet her so-called “selfish” inclination toward
curiosity. She meets her aptitude test
with apprehension for the future it may suggest for her, but her results are
even more world-shaking than she could have anticipated: she is Divergent, someone with multiple
aptitudes and no clear place in her society of never-the-twain-shall-meet
factions. As she moves forward and
explores who she’s supposed to be, hiding her true designation is of the utmost
importance.
There’s
a lot more plot stuff, but even if I only
cover the skeleton of the narrative, there won’t be time for an actual review,
so let’s just hint at creepy societal conformity, secret outsiders, teenage
romance, ultraviolence, the coolest zip-line ever, giant conspiracies,
drug-induced hallucinations, and personal revelations galore. So much going on here. For the most part, it hangs together well – some
of the twists pulled the rug out from under me, though I guessed others early
on, and the book lays some good groundwork for the expanded scope of its
sequels.
So far,
the world-building is the most interesting aspect to me. I enjoy exploring the different factions and learning
about their practices, values, and inner workings. It’s especially interesting to meet the various
transfers (16-year-olds who changed factions at the choosing ceremony.) Though they obviously transferred for a
reason, they still carry the upbringing of their old factions with them, and it’s
neat to see the hodgepodge of their interactions with one another. However, I have to say – there’s just no way the whole faction system is
sustainable. You have certain factions
hating others, Abnegation is sort of the punching bag of the entire city, and
while teens are allowed to leave the faction they were born into if it isn’t
the best fit for them, it’s viewed as a detestable betrayal, and transferring
essentially means breaking from your family forever. Despite its beginnings as a means of peacekeeping,
it’s charged with bristling tensions, tribal superiority, and familial
resentment. No wonder the place is
spoiling for the revolution.
Warnings
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