Book Review: INSURGENT (Spoiler-Free)

As I anticipated my trip to California last week, there were two things I did not look forward to: being away from my family, and being gone when INSURGENT arrived (I pre-ordered it). It was with eager anticipation that I started on it Friday evening, and continued reading for much of Saturday. Other responsibilities meant that I had to put the book down from time to time, but I kept going back to it. By the time I got to page four-hundred-and-something, I should have put the book down and gone to bed. But I couldn’t. One hundred pages away from the end, I had to keep reading. I had to know what happened. And it was so worth it!

As with my review of Elizabeth Norris’s excellent UNRAVELING, it’s hard writing a review of a book that has yet to come out or only just come out–there are lots of people who haven’t read it, and so I need to give you a sense of the book without giving away major plot points. And being the second in the series, I don’t want to assume you’ve read the first book and give too much away about that. It’s hard, but I’ll try!

DIVERGENT introduced us to Beatrice (Tris) Prior, and her dystopian Chicago where the society is divided up into five factions based on the natural strengths of the members of that society: Abnegation, Erudite, Candor, Amity, and Dauntless. At age 16, each person has the opportunity to choose their own faction–it can be the same as the one in which they were raised, or it can be a new faction. If they choose a new faction, they cut themselves off from their old faction and family forever. Tris and her brother Caleb make their choice and live with the consequences. Without going into too much detail, Tris finds herself in a nightmare situation at the end of the book, and she and a few others are on the run.

INSURGENT follows on from the events in DIVERGENT. Tris and her group try to cope with the new reality, and fight the forces that are trying to take over their world. But there’s more to their world than they were aware, and in the midst of the battle, Tris discovers things about her friends and herself she would never have thought. The book ends on a cliff-hanger… let’s just say it’s a game-changer… is that saying too much?

Veronica Roth has outdone herself with INSURGENT. I loved DIVERGENT and eagerly anticipated this book, but I never would have guessed it might be better than the first–but I think it is! The complexity of the characters, the level of action, danger, and story twists, as well as the much-needed breathers for romance and even some comedy, kept me coming back, and eventually turning pages long after I should have been in bed. There is violence, of necessity since our heroes are in a battle situation, but there’s no gratuitous blood-letting. Veronica does a good job of showing us how ugly–even horrific–things are, without glorying in it. Some might be uncomfortable with certain scenes, but I think they are necessary for us to understand what drives the characters to act as they do.

Once again, Veronica has shown that it is possible to write great, heart-pumping, high-octane action and excitement without the need for profanity and sex. Just as with DIVERGENT, there is romance, but it doesn’t go there. PG-13, maybe PG-15 for some of the violence, but that’s all.

The opening four lines are brilliant. If you started this book without having read DIVERGENT, those opening lines would hook you in. It’s not all action, but there is enough in each chapter to keep the story moving. The book may be over 500 pages long, but I compare it to reading HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS, where you end up so intrigued with what will happen next, you blow through pages without stopping to think what the word count might be. And the ending… oh, the ending! Book three can’t come soon enough.

Could book three be even better than this? It’s hard to imagine, but I’m no longer surprised by Ms. Roth and her ability to write great stories. Yes, it’s a YA novel, but don’t let that deter the non-YA reader. I can’t imagine anyone who likes dystopian, or who just enjoys a good action-filled novel, that won’t like this. The appeal of this series is much bigger than YA (which is true for a lot of YA books, but this series in particular). I can’t recommend it highly enough.