Divergent (Divergent #1) by Veronica Roth

Title: Divergent (Divergent #1)

Author: Veronica Roth

Pages: Hardcover 489 pages

Publisher: HarperCollins Children’s Books

Date Published: May 3^rd 2011

Genre: Young Adult, Dystopian, Science Fiction

My Rating: 

 

Goodreads

Beatrice "Tris" Prior has reached the fateful age of sixteen, the stage at which teenagers in Veronica Roth's dystopian Chicago must select which of five factions to join for life. Each faction represents a virtue: Candor, Abnegation, Dauntless, Amity, and Erudite. To the surprise of herself and her selfless Abnegation family, she chooses Dauntless, the path of courage. Her choice exposes her to the demanding, violent initiation rites of this group, but it also threatens to expose a personal secret that could place in mortal danger. Veronica Roth's young adult Divergent trilogy launches with a captivating adventure about love and loyalty playing out under most extreme circumstances.

My Review

Not my favorite book but does deserve five stars because it really was great. Many compared this to The Hunger Game and I can see why. They are very different books but it gives you that same feeling of the characters having no other choice but to live by what society has planned for you. You can say, “well it sounds like any other dystopian story” but it’s a little more than that. Oh and also that “I can’t stop reading it” feeling. By the way, if you have not read The Hunger Games yet you have not lived. Back to Divergent, it had great characters and good twists. The romance was not overworked like most YA books. There was plenty of action. It was also perfectly paced which is something you have to appreciate because it is one thing not every author can accomplish so effortlessly.

Another book I could not put down. Excited for the second book to come out!

I recommend this book to everyone. I believe there is a little something for everyone in this story.

The Water Wars by Cameron Stracher

Title: The Water Wars

Author: Cameron Stracher

Pages: Hardcover 240 pages

Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire

Date Published: January 1^st 2011

Genre: Young Adult, Dystopia

My Rating: 

Goodreads

Vera and her brother, Will, live in the shadow of the Great Panic, in a country that has collapsed from environmental catastrophe. Water is hoarded by governments, rivers are dammed, and clouds are sucked from the sky. But then Vera befriends Kai, who seems to have limitless access to fresh water. When Kai suddenly disappears, Vera and Will set off on a dangerous journey in search of him-pursued by pirates, a paramilitary group, and greedy corporations. Timely and eerily familiar, acclaimed author Cameron Stracher makes a stunning YA debut that's impossible to forget. 




"Let us pray that the world which Cameron Stracher has invented in The Water Wars is testament solely to his pure, wild, and brilliant imagination, and not his ability to see the future. I was parched just reading it."-Laurie David, academy award winning producer of An Inconvenient Truth, and author of The Down to Earth Guide to Global Warming

My Review

When I first read what this book was about I was eager to read it until I actually got to reading it then I had a lot of thoughts on it, some not so great. I will start of about how it made me feel… thirsty, really thirsty. Stracher made it possible for me to crave water, the way he explained the shortage of water and the way the characters were described, lips chapped and at the point of dehydration, I have to say it was pretty intense, made me think about real life and how we might not be using water properly. That was probably the good part of the book, how the author can make you feel a certain way and so extremely. Now I want to talk about the so-so portion of the book. There was so much action, if you are into action filled book, this might be for you. In my opinion there was way too much action, so much that it was really improbable, which was disappointing because the topic of the lack of water was so realistic it was even easy to connect then you get all this action that you get in corny movies in which you think to yourself, “how does that happen? Is that even possible? No one can have that much luck. If it was real life they would have already been dead.” A lot of action in which I waited for something important to happen but nothing ever did, it just went from action to more action and so on. This book was not exactly made for me but it was not so bad.

I recommend this book to anyone into action filled stories and into the dystopian genre.