Tag Archives: Divergent

Some of my favourite stories are ones that are set in our world, but in the near future.  Divergent by Veronica Roth is one of those stories.  It is set in a society where everyone is separated into 5 different factions or groups; Erudite the Intelligent, Dauntless the Brave, Amity the Peaceful, Candor the Honest, and Abnegation the Selfless.  The main character, Beatrice, belongs to Abnegation, the faction that focus on others rather than themselves.  When you get to a certain age, you have to take a test to find out which faction is the best one for you to spend the rest of your life in.  You have the choice of staying in the faction you were born into or changing to your best-suited faction.  Beatrice’s results in her test means that she could choose from three different factions.

She chooses Dauntless, the faction of the daring and fearless, leaving behind her family and a faction that she can’t return to.  To become Dauntless, Beatrice (Tris, as she now calls herself) must pass the 3 stages of initiation.  She makes friends and enemies throughout the initiation, including Peter who will do anything to be the top initiate.   As she goes through the stages of initiation, it becomes clear that Tris is able to manipulate the simulations within the challenges and cope better than anyone else.  She discovers that she is Divergent, but what does that mean and why is it dangerous for anyone to find out that she is?

Divergent is full of suspense and I was on the edge of my seat right to the end.  Tris is an incredibly strong character who gets put through some tough challenges.  As I was reading Divergent I was thinking that I wouldn’t be strong enough to make it through the Dauntless initiation.  Veronica Roth has created a society that, at first, seems like it is perfect, but you see cracks slowly start to appear.  If you like stories like Hunger Games, you’ll love Divergent.  Recommended for 12+      10 out of 10