Allegiant (Divergent #3) by Veronica Roth

With Evelyn and the factionless in control of the city, Tris and Tobias realise they’ve just exchanged the very limited choices of the factions to no choices at all. They quickly become involved in the new rebellion – only this time they are driven to find the truth. What is outside the city

They leave and discover the real truth of the world, the size of it, the history of it – and why their city, why Chicago, even existed. In doing so they learn everything they once knew, everything they once treasured is a lie – it’s meaningless, a manipulation for a completely alien goal.

But as they spend time outside the city with the Bureau, they find both some shocking revelations about their identity – and a new set of lies spread by a new dominant, governing force.

I have a huge problem with the writing of this book – it is told from the point of view of both Tris and Four/Tobias, each chapter topped with their name. This is essential because without that name there is no way to tell who is speaking. Tris and Four have exactly the same voice – which is terrible for two such very different people. There was actually a moment when I thought Tris was revealed as bisexual because it talked about her girlfriend before I realised we’d had a character shift. 4 pages ago. I read 4 pages assuming Tris was the protagonist when it was actually Four/Tobias. That’s… not good.

There’s also another whole load of names that I can only vaguely remember who they actually are

Equally, I found Tris and Tobias’s romance to be… so unnecessary. I can’t say, unlike the last book, that it was badly done. There is some interesting conflict there – I particularly liked the conflict over whether Tobias trusts/respects Tris; it not only analysed Tobias not listening to her or keeping things from her but also raise the counterpoint that “not doing what you say” is not the same as “not listening to you” and Tris’s habit of conflating people not agreeing with her as not trusting her.

I did like a lot of the personal revelations – like these people who have only known the city realising just how vast the whole world is and the culture shock of that. Or of finding out how so many of their precious ideals are just complete fabrications –it’s nicely done.

The meat of the plot, which I found the romance a distraction from, though was the rebellions. In Chicago Tris was rebelling against the Erudite take over in Divergent. Here she starts rebelling against the Factionless take over that happened in Insurgent. She ends up outside the city, learning the true, deep and fascinating history behind the lies she has been taught all her life and why Chicago and the factions even exist.

And there she finds another dominant faction and another rebellion. The dominant faction is “kind” in a patronising way, but over and over again it’s clear that the dominant faction abuses the weaker one, controls them and even while apparently having “kind” agendas to “help” them, is very much keeping them down – in part by destroying their own self worth. It’s also interesting in that it shows this, shows the blatant discrimination, the patronising dehumanisation, the lack of the weaker faction in any places of power, while at the same time having the legal fiction of equality – showing the limits of such legal equality, even while it is important.

Insurgent (Divergent #2) by Veronica Roth

In the aftermath of the Erudite’s co-option of the Dauntless and attack on Abnegation, Tris and Four leave the city and try to rally their forces against the Erudite’s brutal campaign. But what can Candor and Amity do against the Erudite’s technology and the Dauntless training? What can the Dauntless do when split against itself and at risk from the Erudite’s mind control?

Forces have to be rallied in the most unlikely of places, all the while dealing with the fallout of so much loss – and the terrible things Tris has had to do. And under it all is a creeping worry of what they will do – is it right to destroy the Erudite? Can society survive without them? Can it survive if the Erudite win? How can they win a war that seems to have no good outcomes?

In some ways this book continues and confirms my opinion of the world building from Divergent. The faction system is broken, it doesn’t make much sense, it’s not workable, not a useful tool for creating peace let alone one for creating a society that works. That’s not bad world building on the part of the author, that’s what we’re supposed to be seeing – this whole book, even more than Divergent is about showing the flaws of the system, the flaws of each faction and it inevitably breaking down.

Like we see the Amity faction which looks so peaceful and beautiful – and then realise it achieves this by constantly drugging everyone (which is actually an ongoing habit of the whole world – these ridiculous factions are held together with regular doping to avoid any common sense) and, of course, the flaw of Amity being so conflict averse is that their response to evil abuse is to put their hands over their ears and pretend it’s not happening. We see Candor’s honesty is truly merciless with no accounting for people’s pain or experiences – it’s also deeply and utterly impractical in any meaningful away.  We see the factionless in their great numbers – there simply because of the deeply unjust system they operate on; not just the choosing. We’ve seen the Dauntless cruelty, but now see their ableism in discarding anyone who doesn’t fit their physical ideals – and the Erudite in their treatment of anyone who doesn’t match up to their intellectual standards

The factions only last because of constant drugging and a developed knee jerk hatred about every other faction so they constantly support their own without question for fear of being seen as disloyal or “unpatriotic.” Any attempt at thinking clearly and sensibly is clearly Erudite sympathies, any attempt to seek peace is cowardly Amity-ness etc etc. This system designed for peace only lasts because of the created conflict within each faction. Yet this conflict will inevitably lead to the war.

Divergent (Divergent #1) by Veronica Roth

The city is divided among five factions: the selfless Abnegation, the brave Dauntless, the intellectual Erudite, the compassionate Amity and the honest Candor. Every child chooses their faction at the age of 16 after being guided by their test which shows where their tendency lies.

Abnegation-born Tris’s test was inconclusive. She has the traits of more than one faction; she is a Divergent, something she is urged to keep hidden for the sake of her life.

She joins the Dauntless and has to struggle with the vastly different culture there and hope to pass their rigorous, dangerous and arduous tests to earn her place among them – all while concealing her difference.

But in the city tensions between the factions are flaring and the very thing the factions were created to prevent – war – is looming.

At first glance, the world setting for this dystopia seems quite ridiculous to a level of parody. The factions take their “virtues” to such extremes that not only would it be nearly impossible to live according to their principles – but it wouldn’t be advisable to do so either. The factions themselves are ludicrously simplistic, have a ridiculously narrow view of humanity and frequently twist their “virtues” to mean things that are completely nonsensical (like the Dauntless apparently conflating “courage” and “cruelty” to say nothing of “suicidally reckless”); the whole concept of factions ignores the sheer complexity of humanity and the impossibility of dividing people down such simple lines. Even the test they all take is laughable in its simplicity (they picked up the cheese! That means they’re Amity… or hungry… and the poor lactose intolerant would-be Amity are out of luck).

This world setting doesn’t work – cannot work. This society is more than a little ludicrous. The flaws are huge, there are far too many people who fall through the cracks (and there are so many, huge cracks) and it would be a deeply terrible way to try and actually run things.

But I think it’s supposed to be. While the story focuses on Tris’s story and why she doesn’t fit into the world (with a heavy dollop of super-chosen-one-specialness), in the background there’s an ongoing theme that this society doesn’t really work – and that the steps that are taken to make it work are dubious to say the least. We have an entire group of people, the factionless, who are just jettisoned from the system, ignored and regarded with contempt by much of the rest of society (even if it is pitying contempt). We see how much the Dauntless faction has completely twisted and warped what it means to be Dauntless to create a twisted parody of what it once was. It’s shown repeatedly – and even told – that the reason most people fit into these simplistic factions is because they’re basically brainwashed from birth. Of course they’re going to choose the appropriate, simplistic choices on the test because that choice been hammered into their heads from the moment they’re born – hence the rarity and remarkability of faction transfers. The “Divergent” are less people who have aptitude in more than one virtue, but are more reasonably people who have resisted or avoided their familial brainwashing (then with a dollop of Chosen One on top). We see how people exploit the system – an Abnegation abusive father gets away with it because how could one of the selfless do such a thing? A Candor manages to cause all kinds of trouble without consequence because no-one believes he could possibly be lying. And, yes, the Erudite may be up to naughty shenanigans, but the fact that no other faction has a say in government other than Abnegation is deeply flawed and questionable.

We see the flaws in the system – mainly in Dauntless who, even without the twisted sadism and bullying, seem to think that “courage” means “strength” and “bravery” is synonymous with “recklessness”. Even Tris herself has moments of “bravery” which reap more like being a thrill seeker.