REVIEW: DIVERGENT SERIES 3 - ALLEGIANT ~ VERONICA ROTH

It’s been quite a while since I finished Allegiant by Veronica Roth, but truthfully I was so completely underwhelmed and disappointed that I could not be bothered to write a review.  Allegiant commences where Insurgent left off.  Tris and co, not satisfied with the new status quo, joins the rebellion and sets off to discover what lies beyond the boundaries.  They discover that their city is embroiled in an experiment conducted by the Bureau of Genetic Welfare.  Following the Purity war which resulted from attempts to genetically remove negative behaviors from societies, the Bureau was founded to use selective breeding to repair the genetic damage they caused, over several generations by forcibly isolating several populations, including Tris’ home.  These populations were organised into factions to better monitor certain behavioural traits.  The divergents turn out to be genetically pure individuals whose DNA shows none of the genetic damage caused by previous genetic tampering.  The divergent’s importance was however vastly overstated in the video made by Edith Prior (an indication that Roth had no idea how she wanted to end the series at the time she wrote Insurgent).  Tris, Tobias and friends ultimately discover more secrecy and manipulation by the Bureau and take it upon themselves to right to wrongs of past and present.

 

Sadly, this was a very disappointing conclusion to the Divergent trilogy.  It felt like completely different authors had written Divergent, Insurgent and Allegiant.  The author just didn’t have the same voice.  It felt like the Roth had no idea how she wanted to end the series and ultimately just grabbed at straws and rushed to release the final product. 

Tris dying felt absolutely unnecessary – and I don’t say this simply because her death disappointed me.  I truly don’t see why she had to die.  It makes no sense and in no way enhances the story.  It felt… superfluous.  It felt like Roth threw it in there for shock value.  She wanted Tris to sacrifice herself for the greater good (I suppose this was meant to be ironic since Tris had finally decided that she didn’t want to die), but then she needed a much better crafted storyline to justify it; because it fell flat.  When a character death falls flat, it’s a massive disservice to that character and the audience.  Tris deserved a better ending, or at least a better death - something vital.  Uriah’s death upset me more than Tris’ death did because (he was a favourite of mine, yes, but more than that) it was relevant and believable and necessary for the plot. Tris death was none of those things. 

Movie poster

I was curious as to how the movie would portray the events and watched it the very evening I finished the book.  If 10% of the movie is based on the book, it’s a lot.  They made massive, massive changes; the largest of which is having Tris survive.  Granted, at the time they were planning another sequel (which is also evident by the ending), but while the movie is in no way a masterpiece, it is a vast improvement from the book.  Either way I’m sad to say that while Divergent was thrilling and Insurgent was entertaining, completing the Divergent trilogy now feels like a complete waste of my time (too much time and energy I’ll never get back) and the utter disappointment that is Allegiant will prevent me from recommending this series to those who have not yet experienced it. 

 

Product Information:

 

Title: Allegiant

Series: Divergent (not standalone)

Author: Veronica Roth

Publisher: Harper Collins Children's Books

Year: 2013

Pages: 545

ISBN-10: 0062420097ISBN-13: 978-0062420091
ASIN: B00BKZUVGM
 
Related posts:

Review: Divergent ~ Veronica Roth 

Review: Insurgent ~ Veronica Roth

Divergent movie

REVIEW: PERSY AND THE PRINCE ~ JANE MYERS PERRINE

Beyond The Page has graciously provided me with a complimentary copy of this book, via Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.  Thank you!

Persy Marsh grew up in a well-to-do family, with a socially ambitious mother.  Literally making herself sick in order to live up to her mother’s standards, Persy ultimately rebelled, left that life behind and moved into a poor community where she is trying to make a difference.  In the hotel she now works for she meets Jordan Prince, manager of the hotel and member of the wealthy Prince family.  Attracted to each other, Persy and Jordan fight their attraction every step of the way; Jordan knowing a Prince could never get involved with someone like Percy (whom he obviously believes to be a poor dog walker for his hotel), and Percy fearing getting sucked back into the world of the rich she once left behind.  They didn’t count on changing each other, and not caring what society thinks…

I truly hate writing negative reviews, but I honestly battled my way through this one.  Apart from some distracting typos, I had a very hard time warming up to Jordan after his and Percy’s first date. He takes Persy out to a lousy place because he is afraid she would embarrass him at his usual, upper-crust hangouts (and, dare I say, he thinks she should be grateful he deigned to spend his precious time with her at all).  He takes her out with the sole purpose of getting her in his bed.  When she puts a stop to their make-out session, he gets very angry and goes on about how she’d led him on and now refuses to follow through.  When she asks him to forgive her (seriously?!), his response, and I quote: “I don’t want to”.  Such an immature reaction doesn’t endear a leading man to me.  He then states they should never see each other again, and makes her walk home alone – he doesn’t even see her home safely?  How do I respect this guy?  This quote capped it though: “As gorgeous as I am, I don’t understand why she hasn’t fallen madly in love with me”.  I’m not even kidding.  And he’s not just thinking it, he’s saying it to himself in the mirror!  If I had not made a commitment to review this book, this is where I would have stopped reading; at the 11% mark.  He literally thinks to himself “I’ll just stick around until I have her body, then I’ll be content”.  

The next day at the hotel he completely takes advantages of his position as her boss, publicly yelling at her for something she had supposedly done wrong – it turns out she did nothing wrong, but instead of apologising for his behaviour, he finds something else to cause a scene over.  Later he’s intrigued that she’s capable of writing an impressive letter – what, because she’s poor, she’s stupid?  It really went downhill from there.  He enjoys parading by her with a string of glamorous women on his arm, and he says things to her like “You sure know how to ruin an evening”, “stop acting like an idiot” and (after she’s brutally attacked and beaten) “there’s not a man in the world who’d want to be seen in public with your face that colour”. 

I liked the blurb and expected a sweet story about a down-to-earth rich girl who falls in love with an uptight business man, softening his heart with her free-spirited ways - Sadly, this is very possibly the worst so-called hero I’ve come across, and that alone made this book really hard to enjoy.  I like Persy very much and found myself wishing she would raise her standards and find a man worthy of her. I was hoping Jordan would redeem himself towards the end of the book, and while he did improve (slightly), his earlier behaviour had put me off way too much and I just could not come to care for him. 

Product information:

Title: Percy and the Prince

Author: Jane Myers Perrine

Publisher: Beyond The Page

Year: 2014

Number of pages: 153

ASIN: B00KAFQ9HS

REVIEW: FATED ~ ALYSON NOEL

Lately strange things have been happening to Daire Santos. Animals follow her, crows mock her, and glowing people appear out of nowhere. Worried that Daire is having a nervous breakdown, her mother packs her off to stay in the dusty plains of Enchantment, New Mexico with a grandmother she's never met.

There she crosses paths with Dace, a gorgeous guy with unearthly blue eyes who she’s encountered before...but only in her dreams. And she’ll get to know her grandmother - a woman who recognizes Daire’s bizarre episodes for what they are: A call to her true destiny as a Soul Seeker, one who can navigate between the worlds of the living and the dead. Her grandmother immediately begins teaching her to harness her powers - but it’s an art that must be mastered quickly, because Dace’s brother is an evil shape-shifter who’s out to steal her powers. Now Daire must embrace her fate as a Soul Seeker and discover if Dace is the one guy she’s meant to be with...or if he’s allied with the enemy she’s destined to destroy.

Daire Lyons grew up without her father, and without any knowledge of his side of the family.  Living virtually as a gypsy with her Hollywood make-up artist mother, Jennika, Daire travels the world, rubs shoulders with the biggest movie stars, and wonders what a life with roots would be like.  As Daire’s sixteenth birthday approaches, she begins to see something she should not: the dead.  Time stands still, and the dead reach out to her.  Daire ignores and suppresses these events for as long as she can, but on the eve of her sixteenth birthday Daire snaps.  In a desperate effort to escape the dead only she can see, Daire hurts herself and others, including a Hollywood pretty boy, and finds herself headed for a mental institution. 

Desponded and scared, Daire finds a way out from the last source she ever expected: her long lost grandmother.  Paloma Santos contacts Jennika, and somehow she knows about Daire’s visions, claiming she can help Daire overcome them.  Desperate to try anything that will keep her daughter out of a straight-jacket, Jennika ships Daire off to Enchantment, New-Mexico.

Paloma’s herbs and strange Native-American magick soon gets Daire’s visions under control, but it doesn’t eliminate the truth: Daire Lyons is in truth Daire Santos, the last in a line of Soul Seekers - those who can navigate the worlds between the living and dead. There on the dusty plains of Enchantment, New Mexico, Daire sets out to harness the powers of her ancestral legacy, but then she meets Cade and Dace, the twin brothers who have haunted her dreams for months, and things take an alarming turn.  

Repelled by Cade and drawn to Dace, Daire must navigate the foggy ground of altered perceptions, open her mind to the powers of nature, and open her heart to the possibility of pure, unconditional love.     

Fated by Alyson Noel is the first of four books in the Soul Seekers series.  I hate writing negative things about books, and always try to at least start off with some positives, but the truth is I didn’t love this book.  I don’t particularly have an opinion about it – which is the last thing an author wants; leaving no impression at all.

The story is slow paced, which is a huge problem for me.  Taking time to develop a plot is one thing, but it is important for the story to flow, and at least for the first half of the book I did not get that. 

The characters are hard to describe, because Noel doesn’t bother to describe them very well herself.  Noel spent more time and energy on describing the environment, and while Enchantment, New Mexico came to life wonderfully, the characters did not.  In truth, most of the characters are pretty shallow.  Physically, I can tell you exactly what they look like, but Noel didn’t go to much trouble to develop the characters internally as she did in describing their looks.  I didn’t bond with these characters at all, and as a reader, if you don’t care about the characters, you ultimately don’t care about the story. 

As far as Daire’s discovering her powers goes I have to admit that I have never had any interest in Native-American magick, or shamanism, which is a big part of the story.  As a Christian, communicating with your ancestors, soul travelling, spirit animals and basically worshipping nature doesn’t particularly sit well with me, so those parts of the story didn’t fascinate me; I just read to get past it all, truthfully.  Daire’s quest of good against evil, however, is something everyone can relate to, and her relationship with Dace is intriguing – I wish he had a larger part in Fated, but I suspect he will have a much larger role in coming books.  One problem I do have, though, is that I can’t take Cade seriously as a major villain.  I understand that he’s supposedly a powerful sorcerer, but I just find him to be your average, over-confident bad boy.  He doesn’t intimidate at all, and I often found Daire’s weakness in his presence annoying. 

Sadly Fated did not bind me.  I read when I felt like it – I never had a need to desperately discover what happens next.  I doubt that I will read the next book, Echo.  I’m just not compelled to look into Daire’s life anymore.  I think Noel has a certain style of writing that isn’t for everyone.  It’s not the deeply gripping, moving, fast-paced, well developed kind of writing that I prefer.  Character development is a very important component that I look for when reading, and I just did not get that from Noel. 

Product information:

Title: Fated 

Author: Alyson Noel

Number of pages: 464

Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin

Year: 2012

ISBN-10: 0312664850

ISBN-13: 978-0312664855 

REVIEW: RAPTURE ~ LAUREN KATE

Rapture, the fourth and final installment of Lauren Kate’s Fallen series, concludes the story of Lucinda Price and fallen angel Daniel Grigori, whose love brought a curse on them through which Lucinda is destined to die, lifetime after lifetime at the exact moment of enlightenment when she starts to remember their past, only to be reincarnated and have her and Daniel fall in love and lose each other over and over again.

In Fallen  Luce and Daniel meet for the first time in this lifetime.  After initially trying to drive Luce away, Daniel ultimately gives into his love for her once more and their love story starts once again.  In Torment Luce and Daniel are separated as Daniel works to keep Luce safe from several parties who want her dead, and Luce starts to uncover their history.  In Passion Luce embarks on a journey of self-discovery whereby she travels through announcers to watch several of her former selves fall in love with her angel.  Passion concluded with Lucifer attempting to catch all of the fallen angels in an announcer and take them back to the moments in Heaven before the fall, effectively erasing Luce and Daniel’s romance which spans six odd millennia, and rewriting history.  On a mission to save the world’s history, and their love, Luce and Daniel, along with Arianne, Roland, Annabelle, Cam, Shelby and Miles join forces to stop Lucifer. 

Rapture picks up right where Passion left of.  The angels determine that to stop Lucifer, they have to find him first – which means they have to uncover the exact location of the fall.  In order to do so, the angels first need to identify and find three relics, which when combined will reveal the location of the fall.  The majority of Rapture focuses on the angels’ quest to find these three relics.  Luce also keeps spontaneously remembering bits and pieces of her history, bringing her ever closer to finally understanding why she and Daniel are cursed.

Will Luce be able to unlock the ultimate truth hidden deep in her memory?  Will Luce and Daniel finally end the curse that has haunted them both for thousands of years, or will Lucifer succeed in wiping out their love?

I have to say that the conclusion to the Fallen series left me disappointed.  It ended pretty much as I expected.  No big surprises, no major revelations.  It felt like I was reading something I have read before.  I knew what was coming.  On a positive note Kate ventured to explain the prologue of Passion, and also why Daniel couldn’t remember his future self being present at the Roll Call -  two things I had issues with in Passion.

If you’ve read the first three books by now you know, or at least suspect, that Luce herself is also an angel (I really hope Kate didn’t intend for this to be the big surprise of Rapture, as this was pretty obvious), and that the curse stems from her and Daniel refusing to choose sides during Lucifer’s rebellion in Heaven.  Instead of choosing Heaven or Lucifer, Daniel and Luce chose only each other.  For this they were cast out of Heaven and doomed to love, and lose, each other forever. 

The reason why Luce’s not being baptised was so important to the angels is not only because if she should be killed she will not be reincarnated again but die for good, but also something much more significant.  The curse determined that the only time it can be broken would be when Luce is raised by parents who aren’t religious – not being raised according to a certain faith would enable Luce to decide for herself. 

So Luce discovers that she is also an angel… not just an angel, but the third most powerful Archangel.  Daniel, Cam, Arianne, Annabelle, Gabbe, Roland… they were all archangels, closest to the Throne.  When God left Heaven to create earth and mankind, loneliness drew together… Lucinda and Lucifer!  (May I take a moment to point out I was totally right about Lucifer loving Lucinda and the reason their names are so similar!).  Lucifer was the morning star, and Lucinda the evening light.  Their romance was the first ever romantic love between two entities.  However, Lucifer’s love was suffocating Lucinda – he was taking and taking and taking from her, making her lose her light.  Lucinda soon began to realise that Lucifer’s love was obsessive and poisonous, especially when he started urging her to join forces with him so that they could be more important than God.  Lucinda truly loved the Lord and relished adoring Him – she wanted no part of Lucifer’s plan.  When Daniel comforted a crying Lucinda in the meadow, their love story began.  Instead of harming her, Daniel’s love made Lucinda radiant, her light shining brighter and brighter.  Where Lucifer’s love made her weak, Daniel’s love made her strong – though Lucifer introduced her to love, Daniel showed her what it was supposed to be like.  Angry and proud, Lucifer dragged Lucinda before God and started the rebellion that caused the fall.  Instead of remaining by his side, Lucinda moves to Daniel, and they declare their love for each other, the only allegiance they would pledge, and were cast out of Heaven along with millions of other angels.

Forward to present day.  Lucifer, still bitter over losing the angel he loved to a lesser angel, attempts to catch the fall in an announcer, erase the past 6000 odd years, and take all the angels back to the moments before the fall, giving Lucinda the chance to “choose right” this time.  Only Lucinda can convince him that she would make the same choice again.  Finally God intervenes, and Lucinda and Daniel are brought forward to make their choice once more.  Again, they choose only each other and their love.  They are granted their desire to be together – but at a price.  They will lose their immortality, their memories and the powerful force that always brings them together.  They are to be born again as mere mortals, with only one more lifetime to be together.  They accept without hesitation.  Seventeen years later Lucinda and Daniel fall in love for the first, and last, time.

The conclusion to the series truly saddened me.  The fact that Luce and Daniel’s memories were lost bothered me most.  I expected them to become mortal, but I had hoped they would just continue living, knowing what they are to each other.  But no, they start again as babies.  While I am happy that they managed to find each other in their last lifetime, I am very disappointed that they will never know just how much they truly love each other.

I have to say that I intensely dislike the fact that Lucinda and Lucifer were once in love.  This somehow lessened the power and beauty of Luce and Daniel’s romance for me.  Also, I have a major problem with the part of the plotline which states that Lucifer invented love.  The Bible clearly states that God is love, so as a Christian I did not appreciate this approach.  I know Kate had to explain the curse, but I wish she had found another way.  As with Passion, again I wasn’t comfortable with the way Kate depicted God, but I do feel that she at least attempted to be respectful in her writing.

In a final note, Cam’s story is completely unresolved.  I wouldn’t be surprised if Kate wrote a novel about him later on.  In fact, I hope she does.

I would also like to mention that one thing Lauren Kate got absolutely right, is the covers for the books.  

These are, without a doubt, some of my favourite book covers of all time.  Beautiful. I also like how Luce is finally wearing white on Rapture's cover - enlightenment.

Product information:
Title: Rapture

Author: Lauren Kate

Number of pages: 464

Publisher: Delacorte Books For Young Readers 

Year: 2012

ISBN-10: 0385739184

ISBN-13: 978-0385739184 

In conclusion, please allow me a moment to celebrate



REVIEW: HOW DO I LOVE THEE ~ NANCY MOSER

Elizabeth Barrett Browning is the author of my favourite poem, How Do I Love Thee.  This is a poem she wrote while in love with fellow poet Robert Browning, and was for her own eyes only – never intended to be published!  How lovely that Robert was ultimately the one who insisted that Elizabeth’s love sonnets be published, as these are what she is best remembered for today.

How do I love thee by Nancy Moser is a biographical novel, written from Elizabeth Barret's perspective and based on facts. It chronicles a large timespan of her life, and includes most of the major events, as well as the actual wording of letters between Elizabeth and Robert. The one thing I do love about this book, is that it felt like I was reading a classic novel.The writing is that dated.Most current historical novels are indeed set in history, but the writing is very modern; How do I love thee does not have that problem.

One of twelve children, having lost her mother at an early age, Elizabeth and her siblings were raised under the iron fist of their father, who locked them away in seclusion.  To ensure his children didn’t stumble on the sins of the flesh (as he deemed it), he forbade his children to marry – what a hypocrite, right?  Elizabeth, being the victim of weak lungs, was locked up most of all.  Having been convinced by her family and doctors that she was an invalid, Elizabeth never ventured out of her room!  Confining herself to only her bedroom, and mostly only to her bed, Elizabeth’s frail body soon grew too weak to even walk easily, and her life was a ritual of resting and taking medicine. Her only solace was her writing.  In her thirties Elizabeth therefore still lived with her father, happy to be with her family and unmarried.  One day, only to ensure her latest published works would be of equal length, she hastily wrote a 19 page poem in one day, in which she made mention of Robert Browning.  After reading the poem, Robert wrote Elizabeth a letter, and the two soon became pen pals.  And so began one of history's greatest love stories.

Over the years the recluse Elizabeth grew too uncomfortable with the idea of meeting new people, and she refused invitation after invitation from fellow authors who wanted to meet her; but for some reason, when Robert requested a meeting Elizabeth hastily agreed – a fact which didn’t fail to unsettle her.  As their friendship grew, so did their love.  Robert and Elizabeth soon couldn’t deny their love for each other, but her father’s strict rules against marriage stood in their way – could they find a way to be true to her father’s wishes as well as their own hearts?

Throughout all the years and all their travels, both Elizabeth and Robert held on to their respective love letters, and the 573 letters which capture their courtship, their blossoming love and their forbidden marriage are on display at the Wellesley College!  The entire collection is also available to view online.

In this Friday, Feb. 10, 2012 photo, a hand-written original manuscript by Elizabeth Barrett Browning of the epic poem "Aurora Leigh," is held by Mariana Oller, Wellesley College associate curator of special collections at the Margaret Clapp Library, on the campus of Wellesley College, in Wellesley, Mass. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

One major problem that the book does have: I don’t particularly like the heroine.  Initially I found Elizabeth to be very selfish, self-centred and self-indulgent; which is a problem since I am sure she was meant to be portrayed as selfless.  The fact that a 36 year old woman needs a maid who is able to disregard her wants and requests because she herself knows that she is being unreasonable, is just ridiculous.  Show some willpower, woman!  I got very annoyed with Elizabeth’s self-pitying woe-is-me-attitude.  I literally only kept reading in the hopes that her romance with Robert Browning would better her.  Thankfully, it did.  Robert brought Elizabeth to life – in every sense.  He encouraged her to move around, to venture outside, and ultimately to travel abroad!  Without his love and God’s grace, Elizabeth would have died a recluse. 

Another problem: We only meet Robert through his letters a third through the book, and he only becomes a central character halfway through the book.  I understand that this story is biographical and that Elizabeth had a life (of sorts) before she met him, but since this story is about how her love for him changed her, I would have wanted him introduced much sooner – way too much backstory.  It would have suited me just fine if Moser were to fast forward the plot at the point where her brother Bro died, to a few weeks before she met Robert; not years.  I found many of the first chapters completely unnecessary.

I have to say I did very much enjoy the way time stood still when Elizabeth received her first letter from Robert; the way she just knew that her life had changed, though she did not realise how.  The depiction of their friendship, courtship and romance growing steadily over a period of months was very realistically done, and if Moser’s aim was to show how Robert’s love made Elizabeth become the best version of herself, and how God brought them together against all odds, intervened on their behalf and blessed their relationship, she certainly succeeded.

In the historical sense How do I love thee is a lovely portrayal of the life and love of Elizabeth Barret Browning.

Product information:
Title: How Do I Love Thee

Author: Nancy Moser

Number of pages: 368

Publisher: Bethany House

Year: 2009

ISBN-10: 0764205013