karen's Reviews > Allegiant

do i understand why people are all angry at this book?

oh, yes. i understand.

but i loved it.

i loved it for two reasons.


reason number one:








reason number two.

there were things about divergent that were completely unrealistic but i accepted them so that i could enjoy the book. i always thought the factions were silly and reductive and were more like limitations and rules in a game a young child designed. they didn't really make sense, but when you are playing a game with a little kid, you play by their rules or it gets really loud. and as long as you go with the flow and just enjoy the ride without stopping to think "this doesn't really make any sense…" the book is incredibly fun. and so much literature is suspension of disbelief, isn't it?? you accept that in the 1500's there's a potion that can make someone appear to be dead. you accept that a single night of ghostly visitations can change a man's entire character. you accept that a man can put on some costume jewelry and a scarf and pass as a gypsy fortune teller. and that suspension of disbelief is not a problem for me, especially in YA dystopian lit.

but! what allegiant does more or less resolves the problems of the factions and they finally make sense. the explanation raises additional problems, yes, but i really appreciated that something that had been problematic for me from the get-go finally began to become clearer. (view spoiler)[ anything goes in a monitored construct, after all. and as something that was genetically manipulated rather than just arbitrarily chosen, it makes it easier to swallow. now of course, those bratty twins nature and nurture are going to make some noise, but there's plenty of room in the corner for them to play until you're finished reading this book (hide spoiler)]

this book is a bit confusing because not only do we have to contend with the dissent between the factions and the factionless, but now we have all-new mirror dissension between the GDs and the GPs and we are asked to keep everything straight in our heads. the fact that these two situations are mirroring each other is a fantastic echo because of the nature of the two communities; that one is supposed to be "better" than the other and yet is still suffering its own internal strife. a little heavy-handed commentary on human nature, you say?? well, certainly, but it still makes for some good action sequences.

it's a fun little journey through the trickiness of science and natural selection and free will and serum after serum after serum. is it 100% convincing?? no, but i think it stays true to the world roth has built, and her characters feel genuine and three-dimensional, and tris is still one of the great characters in YA lit, even though she seems to have gotten a little too textbook superhero in this one, and doesn't have the elements of her character that made her so likable before. like where she was occasionally uncertain, or flat-out wrong. but no matter - she's still a powerhouse.

giving four a voice for the first time in this one (except for those little novellas) is interesting. it shows the disparity between how he appears to others and how he is really feeling. he is so much less certain and capable than what he is broadcasting to the world, and especially to tris. and she comes across as an even stronger character because of this.

(view spoiler)[ and yeah - her death. it's a heartbreaker, for sure, but she dies while being completely true to who she is, and her death is a good one, a useful one. and honestly, a more dramatic one than tobias dying. knowing what we know of four's character from the inside, now, it is clear that tris could have lived without him. she was willing to give him up because of his actions in this book. she went back to him, sure, but i believe there was enough in her character to stand alone, while four had only really ever unpacked himself for her, so for him to suddenly be without her… well, it's more powerful.it just is (hide spoiler)]

so, yeah. i liked this. i liked it so much more than that weird bloated and meditative insurgent. i agree with many of the criticisms of the book, but it did not stop me from loving it and applauding it as a perfectly fitting conclusion to the series.



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