spoiler visualizarJose.Maltaca 16/04/2019
Off the Rails
Divergent, a book written by Veronica Roth, tells the story of a dystopian society divided by factions, each one representing a human atribute: bravery, friendship, abnegation, erudition and honesty (a.k.a. bad manners). When young people reach the age of 16, they have to choose which faction to live in, abandoning the others and adopting the traits of the chosen faction. However, if a person does not succeed to fit into a faction, he or she will be factionless and live among the poor, unless this person is divergent, which means that they are special, and have traits of many factions. Caught in the middle of this mess is Tris, an Abnegation girl who discovers to be Divergent, chooses Dauntless (the brave ones), falls in love with a boy and finds her courage.
Alright, here we have a set up for a plot full of intrigue, hormones, and tons of derivative plot points. The factions feel much like an attempt to establish a connection to the readers and fuel Buzzfeed test feeds, besides being reminiscent of much less obvious house selections like in the Harry Potter books (even in Percy Jackson, for that sake). The characters go around in trains, have training grounds, get zombified and have to fight an evil plot which relates to the whole government. I had already read all that in the Hunger Games. Besides, the ending also reminded me of the latter, but not in a good manner: it feels crammed and rushed, like if the author just wanted to get that over with. Everything that did not happen until page 400 happens in 80 pages, leaving the reader confused at what the heck is happening and why the characters did not get slaughtered right away.
This brings me to the villains of the story. First things first: it is a teenage dystopian phantasy, meant to be read by teenagers. How can an author depict people who read books as the evil faction, lustful for power and full of greed, while people who clearly use force to fight are the “good guys”? It can really be harmful to those who read it in their tender years, inciting prejudices and discouraging readers to seek knowledge. Besides, these people are depicted are really stupid: a section near the end of the book reminded me of Dr. Evil and his plans in Austin Powers, and this is not a compliment at all. Not mentioning tons of discrepancies and the corny ending (the power of love wins again). The book has a couple of good moments around its middle, but it goes way downhill from there. Divergent is a copy and paste of elements of more successful book series, but turning what is good in them into bad elements and keeping their worst aspects. I do not recommend this book.