Divergent (Divergent #1) by Veronica Roth

Publisher: Harper Collins

Source: Bought (Barnes and Noble)

Edition: Hardcover

Pages: 487

Rating:

In Beatrice Prior's dystopian Chicago, society is divided into five factions, each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue—Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). On an appointed day of every year, all sixteen-year-olds must select the faction to which they will devote the rest of their lives. For Beatrice, the decision is between staying with her family and being who she really is—she can't have both. So she makes a choice that surprises everyone, including herself.

During the highly competitive initiation that follows, Beatrice renames herself Tris and struggles to determine who her friends really are—and where, exactly, a romance with a sometimes fascinating, sometimes infuriating boy fits into the life she's chosen. But Tris also has a secret, one she's kept hidden from everyone because she's been warned it can mean death. And as she discovers a growing conflict that threatens to unravel her seemingly perfect society, she also learns that her secret might help her save those she loves… or it might destroy her.

Before my review, I have an interesting story to tell... This past semester in college, I took a class called Young Adult Dystopian Literature; what a dream, right? (The only downside was it was Saturday at 9 AM...) Prior to the beginning of classes, I emailed the professor and asked her which books we would be reading because I was ridiculously excited for this class just like any other YA book lover would be. She threw a few titles out like The Hunger Games, Feed, Uglies and more, but was also taking suggestions. At the time I hadn’t heard anything but amazing things about Divergent, so I figured I would recommend that book along with a few others that I had really wanted to read. Luckily, she took Divergent into consideration and chose it as a book for the class!

Now that story time is out of the way… I loved this book. Everyone in the class really appreciated that I chose to recommend this book because they all loved it just as much as I did! Even the male students (who didn’t seem to enjoy many of the female-narrated books [Uglies, Matched]) really enjoyed this one. I think the main reason I enjoyed this book was the non-stop action. I hardly ever read books with this much action in them (besides The Hunger Games,) and I really think I should read more because it had my adrenaline pumping constantly.

You didn’t think I was going to forget to mention Four did you? He’s the second main reason why I loved this book so much. I dare you to read Divergent and not get butterflies for this . I swear it’s got to be almost impossible. By the way, now that Four's real name has been revealed, am I required to call him that? I’ve grown to love the name Four and am having a hard time parting with it.

I hope everyone that’s reading this review takes this sincere recommendation I’m giving to you right now, and go buy/borrow/beg for this book. I can almost guarantee that you won’t regret it and if you do, I give you full permission to yell at and slap me for hyping this book up for you.

I plan on being one of the first people in line to get an autographed copy of Insurgent at BEA and need to prepare myself on being professional, and not a crazy fangirl. Even though inside my head the only thing that will be going on is "OMG VERONICA ROTH IS SIGNING MY BOOK. MY LIFE IS COMPLETE."