{Audiobook} Review: Allegiant by Veronica Roth

Title: Allegiant
Author: Veronica Roth
Narrator:  Emma Galvin, Aaron Stanford
Series: Divergent, book #3
Length:  11 hrs 51 mins
Publisher: Harper Audio
Publication Date: October 22, 2013
Source: purchased
Purchase: Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Audible

One choice will define you.

What if your whole world was a lie?
What if a single revelation—like a single choice—changed everything?
What if love and loyalty made you do things you never expected?

The faction-based society that Tris Prior once believed in is shattered—fractured by violence and power struggles and scarred by loss and betrayal. So when offered a chance to explore the world past the limits she’s known, Tris is ready. Perhaps beyond the fence, she and Tobias will find a simple new life together, free from complicated lies, tangled loyalties, and painful memories.

But Tris’s new reality is even more alarming than the one she left behind. Old discoveries are quickly rendered meaningless. Explosive new truths change the hearts of those she loves. And once again, Tris must battle to comprehend the complexities of human nature—and of herself—while facing impossible choices about courage, allegiance, sacrifice, and love.

Told from a riveting dual perspective, Allegiant, by #1 New York Times best-selling author Veronica Roth, brings the Divergent series to a powerful conclusion while revealing the secrets of the dystopian world that has captivated millions of readers in Divergent and Insurgent.

At first, I thought my feelings toward this final installment were based solely on my disconnect with the audiobook, but I've discussed with others who've echoed my sentiments about this book feeling really slow. Like I was slogging through all of these details and all of this information, and I couldn't really even bring myself to care.  The thing is, it wasn't even a lack of action because STUFF happens, but as with Insurgent, I just never felt the same connection to the characters that I did in the first book, and I really missed that.

I will admit, a lot of my problem with this book did revolve around my lack of love for the narration.  Aaron Stanford as the voice of Four was great, and he should have been, considering the fans got to pick that voice to represent their beloved Tobias.  But I was in the middle of listening to Endless Knight which also features Emma Galvin as the narrator, and switching to this one with her as the voice of Tris left me disappointed. First, I kind of loathe her as the voice of Evie in Kresley Cole's YA series.  I didn't mind her as the voice of Tris when I listened to Divergent as a refresher to Insurgent last year, but this time around, I found it difficult to listen to her portray this character.  It's probably my fault for listening to her narrate a series that I'm not loving and then attempting to shrug that off and listen to her as Tris again, but I just didn't connect with her as Tris at all this time.  I actually found myself wishing Aaron Stanford could have narrated the entire book.

But, since this was a dual narrative, I understand why that wasn't possible.  Even so, this felt more like Four's book...like more emphasis was put on his story arc than ever before, which makes sense since he got his own point-of-view in this book, but I think his story ended up overshadowing Tris's.  Maybe that's why it was so easy for Veronica Roth to commit to the ending she wrote for these characters.  And, gawd, did she commit.  This was not the ending I was expecting, nor was it the ending I was hoping for, but it was real, and I can't fault the author for that.  This was a story about war and human nature and it's impossible to tell a story like that without the loss of lives, without the loss of favorite characters.

I know this book isn't being received as well as expected, and I know I'm rating it lower than I expected to, but it's not a bad book.  It forces the characters to look at some hard truths and face even harsher realities, but it's a dystopian novel, and I don't think readers could have realistically expected sunshine and rainbows for these characters at the end of the day.  I'm not usually a fan of epilogues because it feels like they're always used to soften the blow of the true ending of the story, and that's definitely the case with Allegiant, but I think it was warranted in this situation.  I, for one, really needed to see what became of the factions, the GDs and the GPs, if and how they worked things out.  I'm not sure I really ever understood which side we were supposed to be campaigning for, but I feel like they're all on the same path now...or at least headed in the same direction.

This final book was more than a little depressing, but it was a fitting end, I think, for our Abnegation, Amity, Candor, Erudite, and Dauntless friends.  I'm glad to be done with this world and all its political maneuvering, but I'm excited to see what Veronica Roth has in store for us next.

About the author:

Veronica Roth is from a Chicago suburb. She studied creative writing at Northwestern University, and wrote DIVERGENT (Katherine Tegen Books, May 2011) and INSURGENT (May 2012). The third and final book in The Divergent Trilogy, ALLEGIANT, will come out on October 22, 2013. In the meantime she will spend endless hours browsing Wikipedia in her pajamas as she eats corn flakes. (Or some other kind of bland breakfast cereal.)

Find Veronica:

Website | Twitter | Tumblr | Goodreads

Labels: audiobooks, divergent trilogy, dystopian, harper-collins, post-apocalyptic, reviews, veronica roth