Insurgent

I have found that many series quality tends to degrade as more and more books get added. I'm not sure if that is because I tend to become less enchanted by the novels as the go along or the author does. That will be for posterity to decide. What I do know for sure is that I enjoyed Veronica Roth's second novel Insurgent much more than I ever liked Divergent.

The main reason for my change of heart was that most of if not all the main characters realized what I found most annoying about the first novel, that a society based on "Factions" is not only illogical, but impossible. The ending of this novel vindicated me in this belief. Nahny, Nahny Boo Boo to you faction system.

As with the first novel, the characters are well written. The love story is still chaste, but is getting more intense with that Ooey Gooey teenage angst that many readers (both teenage and some much older that teenage!)love. But unlike the first novel, as society begins to pull itself apart, the characters begin to see the flaws in their society. I must say I did find it a tad annoying to go from the first novel where "Divergence" was this supper rare, secret trait that people had heard of (maybe) but had never seen, well not so in the second novel. I swear the characters literally could not swing a cat without hitting a divergent (accidentally of in some cases on purpose!) It did not stop my annoyance when this was explained in the end of the book.

As in real life, the characters became much greyer. As I said about the first novel, not everyone is good all the time, and actions one character sees as good another sees as evil. That is the true nature of humans, and Veronica Roth does an excellent job of showing it in Insurgent.

Although I had initially wrote this series off, after reading this second novel, I'm seriously considering continuing of with the series.