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One choice can transform you. Pass initiation. Do not fail!
In sixteen-year-old Beatrice Prior's world, society is divided into five factions - Abnegation (the selfless), Candor (the honest), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent) - each dedicated to the cultivation of a particular virtue, in the attempt to form a "perfect society."
At the age of sixteen, teens must choose the faction to which they will devote their lives. On her Choosing Day, Beatrice renames herself Tris, rejects her family's group, and chooses another faction. After surviving a brutal initiation, Tris finds romance with a super-hot boy, but also discovers unrest and growing conflict in their seemingly "perfect society."
To survive and save those they love, they must use their strengths to uncover the truths about their identities, their families, and the order of their society itself.
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Review by: kiwireviewer-00
Dated: 9th of June, 2011
I was expecting a story of some post-apocalyptic wasteland, or perhaps some post-crisis evolve civilisation that had found a successful way to keep the species alive and intact without war... Well, it turns out I was wrong... utterly so on both counts... but oh-so-right when I thought it was going to be a twisted plot that would keep me guessing.
I so appreciate that, and find it especially impressive in a debut such as this. Well done Veronica Roth! The main characters were well developed, enough to give them depth, yet not so much as to be over the top or irrelevant, while the characters who don't play significant roles have only enough detail to get by - optimised and efficient, yet seamlessly invisible to those who are lost in the reading.
Without giving the plot away, there isn't a huge amount I can say, but I do want to comment on how detailed the world was. I loved how real-world landmarks were described in such detail... it was only by pure chance that I happened to watch the movie "Source Code" and see the shiny silver 'bean' described so well in the book... and the descriptions matched so well I could easily recall the passage from the book and 'see' the characters standing underneath it, staring at their own reflections so distorted.
Overall, this is a stunning start, and I look forward to seeing more from this shining new star. The way she took an interesting 'possible social evolution' concept and built a functioning world from it, complete with intrigues, romance, loyalties and betrayals... stunning, simply stunning.
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