Not with a bang but with a whimper

So, first of all, if you haven’t read this book yet, STOP RIGHT NOW and don’t read any further.  I’m not going to reveal any major spoilers, but I am going to hint at them so if you’re only halfway through Divergent, stop right now and go read some other review.

I was a bit underwhelmed by this final installment in the Divergent series.  I loved the first book, liked Insurgent, but found myself a bit frustrated with Allegiant.  The first thing that bugged me was the split viewpoint—half the chapters written from Tris’s point of view and the other half narrated by Tobias.  Veronica Roth has channeled the “voice” of Tris so well in the first two books that Tobias’s chapters never quite work. They sound almost the same and I kept forgetting that she had shifted POV until something would clue me in that this was Tobias and not Tris.  Also, I was immediately suspicious about the reason for this POV change in book #3 and it turns out I was right.

This novel picks up immediately after Insurgent ends and involves both Tris and Tobias escaping Chicago and finding out what lies beyond the walls.  Of course, what they find, is more dysfunction and there are more plans, more intended sacrifices, and, as always, a body count.  It’s alternately disapointing and interesting to learn what lies behind the curtain of this dystopian future, but I never fully invested in this last installment.