Nina @ Death Books and Tea

Review: Ever since I finished Divergent, I wanted to know what would happen next. I also hoped that book two would be just as good as book one, something that happens less often than not. Luckily, with Divergent/Insurgent, I was not disappointed.You definitely have to have read Divergent-it jumps straight into the action with very little flashbacking to the events of the previous novel. Which is good, but when it’s been a year since you’ve read book one, it takes a little time to get used to it.There is so much packed into the 525 pages that it’s surprising that it’s surprising It’s not longer. There isn’t a moment in the whole novel when Tris is not on the run, about to be executed, being forced to do something she’d rather not, and generally trying to stay alive. Everything happens in such quick succession, there just isn’t a convenient place to stop. Not even the end.I’m glad we get to see more of Candor and Amity, the factions that Tris didn’t have aptitude for, because they wee fairly overlook in Divergent. In Insurgent, they get their fair share of coverage which sets us up nicely for what we might be getting in book three.There’s a huge amount of characters in this, a few new, mostly recurring and most in different lights to what we had in book one. Some of them were a little hard to keep up with, especially with similar names. It’s also a little confusing with Tris going back and forth between factions in various states of captivity. However, it was easy though to fill in gaps.Once again, the writing is great. It details everything and gives all the characters their own personality, their secrets, and strengths and weaknesses.The thing that got me most was the way that Veronica managed to make me feel for all the characters when they die. Especially the minor ones. General thought processes: somebody major dies-good for them. Somebody we’ve seen for a couple of pages dies-NO NO NO WHY. And considering I don’t normally care about character deaths, that’s saying something.And the ending. What a cliffhanger. And now we have to wait another year or so for the third and final book. Damn.Overall:Strength 5 tea. It’s difficult to top Divergent. Insurgent did.