Book♥Audiobook Review: Insurgent (Divergent, #2) by Veronica Roth

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 guilt, 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.

"New York Times" bestselling author Veronica Roth's much-anticipated second book of the dystopian "Divergent" series is another intoxicating thrill ride of a story, rich with hallmark twists, heartbreaks, romance, and powerful insights about human nature.

Review

This book in 3 words? WAAAYYY TOO LONG!

This book in an almost-sentence Nothing happened for such a long book.

This book in a photo?

Second degree heart block, some P waves are not conducted through the AV node.

I remind you that a normal ECG is...

Let me explain, some of the action parts seemed to not be conducted, as in they were not followed through. Just as I thought OHHH this is going to be goood! The plot does a nose dive. UGH!

Okay this is going to be a short review as I am about to leave for my uni's book club.

So this book for me started out great! The plot was advancing and it really looked better than Divergent. I was thinking "Oh goodie! So maybe this was what other felt about Divergent, maybe I am finally getting their feelings!" And I was hopelessly disappointed.

I am not going to forget the good parts but I really thought that Veronica wrote on a piece of paper random events and actions and just wrote them into the book because she can and she needed a whole book worth of "fluff". To me none of the events that happened in the book really developed anything. The plot barely advanced from point A to point B. Maybe in book 3 all the events might link back and it will blow my mind (like Naruto, sweet baby Jesus did I die from feels), or maybe it won't, but I really don't give a crap anymore. I really think it was an activation energy diagram and that the activation energy is HUGE! I really wanted to throw a catalyst into the reaction and make that explosion of action happen.



So basically I am just telling my sister to read the first few chapters and the last few chapters (also my advice to her for Catching Fire). You really won't miss much.

You might argue the character developed, I mean sure but it wasn't worth the whole 400+ pages worth of it. I knew Tris was a fricking BAMF so I don't want to read more about how cool she is. In fact that sort of defeats the purpose of convincing me that she is awesome. But I do say I liked Tris even more in this book. She is really different from most YA female leads. She IS actually strong, and heartless (somewhat), and selfish (somewhat). She can be rude, and mean and I really appreciated that. She can be soft (but not whiny soft) and it really connected with me (and probably most readers). She struggled in a non-whiny way. She got over her problems fast, with just enough time for the readers to empathize with her but not too long for us to get bored.

And as for Tobias, ugh, I still can't make myself like him. I don't know why but I always, ALWAYS pictures him as a wide, muscular, short dude (even though that is probably not how he looks like). I can't help it! I don't know why my brain is doing this to me! I really just find me unattractive. Blah.

Also it had been a while since I read the Divergent and I kind of forgot who was who. There were just too many characters to keep track of and I frankly didn't really care about them. I kind of wish Veronica have a character list in the front or the back of the book so I can refer back to who was who. (And when I went to my book club, most forgot who was who).

I was also surprised that most of the member in the book club didn't enjoy the angst-y love between Tris and Four. CAN I GET A HIGH FIVE?!! Wait, will it be funny if I say: Can I get a high four? Okay maybe not. Anyway, I was very glad that many people felt the same way.

Some of the things that happened in the novel were unpredictable, well, I didn't really predict anything because I really didn't want to predict nor care for it. It is like me just going with the flow, I don't care if this happened or that happened. This normally happens to be when I don't find a point with the book or the plot. There were some of the events were very predictable. I was like "Ha! I knew it!"

Now as for the ending, it was good, but cliche. Veronica wrote an ending that craved for attention and need for the next book. But liked I said, cliche, you probably can predict what happened in the first part of book 3 with that ending.

Anyway, I need to get going.

 

And as for the audiobook? I really don't have anything bad to say. Emma did another fantastic job with it. Her voice fits Tris' toughness. I find a lot of old audiobooks (by that I mean 5-ish years ago), have VAs that sound like 12 year-old. I really don't want to sound mean or anything but it was unpleasant to listen to them talk. With their high-pitched, whiny voice, it was hard to sit through a recording. But with Emma and the growing number of VAs, the voice was nice to listen to. Emma was able to project the other emotion Tris had. You definitely could distinguish the tones and feelings in her voice. Her pauses between sentences were great. So a 5/5 is needed to be given.