Insurgent, by Veronica Roth (Divergent #2)

Disclaimer: All reviews are the result of my personal opinion from a Christian stand-point. These reviews are provided for those who share my beliefs and morals, to help guide what fiction a reader may wish to pick up. For those who do not share these beliefs, please refrain from hateful comments. It is due to rude commenting that I must now include this note prior to all reviews. For more information, visit my purpose behind this blog. Thank you for your understanding.

Summary:
Intended Age-Group:  16+
Issues of Violence: some graphic images (shooting, stabbing, torture)
Intimacy Level: kissing/making-out
Swearing: b*st*rd, h*ll, using God's name for exclamations
Recommendation: 4 out of 5 stars

Blurb:

"One choice can transform you -- or it can destroy you. But every choice has consequences and as unrest surges in the factions all around her, Tris Prior must continue trying to save those she loves -- and herself -- while grappling with haunting questions of grief and forgiveness, identity and loyalty, politics and love.

Tris's initiation day should have been marked by celebration and victory with her chosen faction; instead, the day ended with unspeakable horrors. War now looms as conflict between the factions and their ideologies grows. And in times of war, sides must be chosen, secrets will emerge, and choices will become even more irrevocable -- and even more powerful. Transformed by her own decisions but also by haunting grief and fuilt, radical new discoveries, and shifting relationships, Tris must fully embrace her Divergence, even if she does not know what she may lose by doing so."

Initial Reaction: *****
Insurgent grabbed me from the beginning when Tris started exploring different factions and finding out their stances on the war. The only downside to this was confusion since I hadn't read Divergent for a while. I had trouble keeping straight the new characters, locations, newly developed serums, and who led which faction. BUT, that's my own weak memory's fault. It just means Roth wrote a multi-layered story and I can't complain about that.

Plot: *****
Such a strong plot! Veronica Roth doesn't dumb anything down. The story picks up from where Divergent left off without even a blink between scenes. As the plot progresses, so does the depth, tension, growing uprisings, and action. What I loved most about this plot was looking at how different factions respond to the same problems. It was absolutely fascinating.

I greatly appreciated the lack of love triangle or dystopian-turned-romance. So often in YA, the girl just obsesses over the boy (or vice versa) and we read a lot of kissing and inner turmoil. Thankfully, Tris and Tobias seemed to realize that saving the world trumped their romantic turmoil and stuck together through it all anyway.

Characters:  *****

To be frank, Tris annoyed me a little, but she had a good excuse. She was going through a lot -- dealing with the regrets of murder, the loss of loved ones, the danger of being Divergent, the uprising of her faction, etc. I thought she handled these in a very...human manner. I felt her pain and understood why she made the decisions she did.

Okay, let's move on to Tobias. NOT my favorite person in this book. The strong mysterious leader we met in book one has been replaced with a man who doesn't seem to understand Tris (or care about understanding) or care that she's struggling with so much. He struck me as a whiner who threw out ultimatums to the girl he's supposed to love. He lost my affection.

HOWEVER, these reactions from Tris and Tobias are realistic to how I would expect normal people to react to their lifestyle being destroyed. I can't fault either of them, but I also loved them a little less. ;)

Spiritual Content: *****
Tris starts questioning "her parents' faith" more and more. She sees a different display of relationship with God when she visits Amity and I felt it shows the multiple ways we can relate to our Creator. I liked watching her ask these questions, even though the story didn't dig too deep into them.

Overall Recommendation:
I enjoyed Insurgent, especially reading it right after Divergent. It picks up the story without even a blink between scenes. I recommend it as a very strong sequel in a great dystopian series. It stays clean with mild language, some kissing, but overall driven by thick plot.

Do it, my friends. Read it. And tell me what you think.
 

Nadine Brandes is an adventurer, fusing authentic faith with bold imagination. She writes stories about brave living, finding purpose, and other worlds soaked in imagination. Her debut dystopian novel, A Time to Die, released September 2014 from Enclave Publishing. When Nadine's not taste-testing a new chai or editing fantasy novels, she is out pursuing adventures. She currently lives in Idaho with her husband. You can find out more about Nadine and her books at http://nadinebrandes.com.