Book Review: Divergent Trilogy Review

Divergent Trilogy

Divergent:  Four Stars out of Five

Insurgent: Three and Half Stars out of Five

Allegiant: Three Stars out of Five

Author: Virginia Roth

I recently reviewed Divergent the book and compared it to Divergent the movie. In this review, I continue the Divergent trilogy series book review. Divergent was published in 2011, with Insurgent following one year later in 2012, and the concluding book Allegiant in 2013. The three books describe a post-apocalyptic world that is centered on Chicago some seven or more generations after a catastrophic war. The primary protagonists are sixteen year old Beatrice/Tris and her eighteen year old boyfriend, Four/Tobias. They live in a society that has been split into five factions that emphasize a single personality trait: Abnegation (selflessness), Amity (kindness), Candor (honesty), Dauntless (bravery), and Erudite (intelligence).

In book one, we are introduced to the world Beatrice and Four live in. At sixteen, each member of a faction must choose the faction in which they will live out their lives. Beatrice and her brother Caleb separated by less than a year in age make a choice that takes them away from their birth faction of Abnegation. This very clever plot point by author Virginia Roth creates a situation where Beatrice’s and Caleb’s parents must demonstrate their love and understanding as regards their children’s choices; it is particularly astute writing as Roth later brings the Four character into the story and discusses his choice to move to a new faction wherein his choice was based on a stark contrast, his desire to flee an abusive father. Such clever uses of plot and character points are used by Roth throughout the three books to discuss behavioral traits that she appears to believe are important aspects of any society.

Divergent continues in a clever (if somewhat formulaic) manner by following Beatrice’s (now renamed Tris) initiation into the Dauntless faction. Here she learns firsthand their primary focus on bravery and meets her initiation instructor and boyfriend-to-be, Four (aka Tobias). Book one describes a pending plot by Erudite’s leader Jeanine against Abnegation that Four and Tris confound, but do not completely defeat. In book two, Insurgent, the plot by Jeanine continues and is ultimately thoroughly defeated by Tris, Four and their new colleagues, the Factionless; a group that is led by Four’s mother, Evelyn. Book three, Allegiant describes a rising resistance movement against the now oppressive Evelyn and the Factionless. The rebel army (the Allegiant) is led in part by Four’s other parent, his abusive father Marcus. Tris and Four leave Chicago as their part in the resistance movement requires them to seek information from those outside of Chicago. In their interactions with those outside of the city (The Bureau), they learn the true history of Chicago and its inhabitants. This history includes revelations that convince Tris and Four that further revolution is needed, this time against the Bureau and their concept of who is “genetically pure” and who is “gene-damaged”.

All three books are well crafted from several technical points of view. In particular, the plot pacing is great in book one, while the characters are so well described in books one and two that it is easy to become captivated or repulsed by several of the central characters. However, while the plot is well paced and logical in Divergent, the first book in the trilogy, it starts to suffer in books two and three. In book two, Insurgent, the plot becomes repetitious and the story-telling is damaged on several occasions with scene segues that seem like editorial miscues. However, my biggest complaint with the trilogy is with an absence of character development.

Consider the case of Tobias. The story alludes in the first book to his abuse as a child and then better defines his backstory in book three. Roth goes so far in book three to use the first person narrative with both Tris and Tobias (after using it only for Tris in books one and two); presumably to better focus on Tobias. I do not find this textual technique to be useful and, in fact, the use of Tobias as the narrator suffered from a poor delineation of his voice from that of Tris’ voice. I often had to re-read some sentences to verify who was speaking, their voices were so similar. But complaints about narrative voice aside, Tobias’ character could have provided a great opportunity for Roth to show Tobias’ evolution as he came to know himself in his new faction of Dauntless (after leaving his father in Abnegation): how his competition and differentiation from the rival Dauntless leader Eric drove him deeper into the Dauntless mindset,  and then again as his relationship with Tris and her driven personality began to interact. Instead, Four’s true personality, one developed in a household ruled by fear, is not even very well defined until very late in book three. Instead, his Dauntless-defined personality of fearless bravery is solely on display throughout books one, two and most of three. There is virtually no change observable in his character, merely a recitation of the events that would have defined a real person. A similar case could be made for Tris. She advances the plot throughout all three books, but her character remains virtually untouched by all the events she lives through. With the potential exception of Tobias' mother Evelyn, none of the characters ever seem affected by their circumstances such they seem to grow or change in any manner.

That a novel designed for the Young Adult audience follows many of the YA genre themes and plot conventions, and lacks characters that resemble actual people by having those characters growing with the plot’s influence on them, does not come as a great surprise. But in a novel series that showed such promise in the first book, it does come as a disappointment.

Footnote:  It seems like Roth recognized her missed opportunity with Tobias late in book three and started to better show the forces that shaped the youthful Tobias. In addition, Roth has since the publication of Allegiant published a fourth book that consists of short stories revolving around Tobias/Four.  I wonder if she too began to see him as a character with greater potential and an additional opportunity to better tell the Divergent tale.