I’m going to start this review by saying that this book is so out of the realm of what I usually read. So keep that in mind.
First, the stuff I liked. The world that Veronica Roth created for this book is fascinating and incredibly well formed. The characters are wonderful (even when they are absolutely horrible). It was incredibly creative and I always felt like Roth knew what was going on, which I don’t always feel reading sci-fi/fantasy.
Now the stuff I didn’t like so much. First, there was the format. The book flipped between two perspectives and one of them was in first-person while the other was in third-person. I was incredibly distracted by this and it made me feel really connected to one character and I just couldn’t bring myself to care as much about the other. Also, this book is incredibly graphic in its violence. I have a low tolerance for this sort of thing and, to be honest, it makes it hard for me to recommend it to teenagers. I think that passages could have been just as powerful if they didn’t describe every terrible moment of a horrific incident.
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