Review: Allegiant by Veronica Roth

Title: Allegiant

Author: Veronica Roth

Publisher: Katherine Tegen Books

Publishing Date: October 22, 2013

Pages/Format: 526, Hardcover

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.

Initial Reaction of Book in One Word:

Warning: If you haven't read Divergent, Insurgent, or Allegiant, you are reading this incoherent review at your own risk because there will be spoilers.

This is so fucking hard.

What do you say about a book that makes you feel how Allegiant makes me feel? A book that makes you feel hurt and sick and broken and depressed and sad? A book that made you cry while reading it, when you finished it, when it so much as crossed your mind, when you were in the shower, while you're writing its review? Nothing. But you try to say something.

I considered making this review into a video, but then decided against it because a) I'm so totally crying and b) I sound super dramatic. But part of me stills want to do it so you can see how I feel (is that weird?). Either way, I'm trying to put this book into words, and it's going to be one long rant and review and whatever you want to call it.

Let's get the elephant out of the room: Tris Prior is dead. (It still doesn't seem real, does it?) And because of that, because of that one death, this entire trilogy is changed.

I feel like there's this unspoken, subconscious trust we--or at least I, as I've realized with Allegiant--have in books (and movies and shows, etc.). And that is that certain characters are untouchable. You know when you're a watching movie or a TV show and it looks like a certain character is going to die, but you know they won't because it's that character's show, or that character is just too big to die? And then the movie or show is over and you were right, they didn't die, and that's because they can't. It's that unspoken trust, maybe even a rule of sorts, that certain characters just do not--cannot--die. (Old age is an exception.)

Every book has characters. Some are minor, some are main, but there is always at least one THE Main Character, the person that story is about. Up until Allegiant, the trilogy was all about Tris. If you were to rename the books after a person, they'd be called Tris, not Tobias/Four. And THE Main Character is supposed to be untouchable. The books are about that person and it's their POV and they just can't die, you trust them not to die, and you believe in that trust. So when Tris Prior, THE Main Character in the Divergent trilogy, died, I lost that trust and it HURT.

I understand why characters are killed off. I do. And in books like the Divergent trilogy, with the way the world is, that makes sense--it's not some fairy tale meadow of perfection. BUT. I expect anyone to die, can die, and may die, except for two people (in most cases): THE Main Character and THE Love Interest. I'll be honest, due to things I'd seen about Allegiant (nothing direct, just lots of crying and this and that), I thought Tobias was going to die. And I was freaking out, because I knew that would crush me. And I didn't think Tris's death would effect (affect? Whatever.) me so much, but my gosh, it DID. It DID. I said that if Tobias died I thought I might slip into how I felt after reading TFiOS, and I didn't want to go back there. I hate all that emotion inside, and with Tris's death I think it's WORSE. I honestly kind of feel like throwing up right now (though I did drink water a bit ago, which doesn't help). And I just want the day or hour or minute to be here RIGHT NOW when I can stop mourning her death and feel normal again.

Back to what I said about certain people not dying and how I understand that characters need to be killed off. There are several books where big characters die, and a few love interests, but I can't think of anything where THE Main Character or THE Love Interest died. (With the exception of The Fault in Our Stars, but that's kind of different because it's not a dystopian or anything, it's about cancer. But that book crushed me. So let's not talk about it.) Let's face it: The Divergent trilogy is no small trilogy. It's freaking huge. When you get to the end of a book, especially a series, you have expectations, and for me at least, one of those is Happily Ever After. You expect THE Main Character and THE Love Interest to survive through everything (though they may have some cuts, bruises, emotional damage, etc.) and be together forever and ever and they live happily ever after, The End.

Katniss and Peeta got it. Lena and whoever the hell she chose in Requiem got it (I think). Sam and Astrid (the Gone series) got it. (Diana and Caine weren't, in my opinion, the THEs, otherwise they'd be in the category of one of THE Love Interests dying.) Jack and Schuyler from Blue Bloods got it. Patch and Nora (Hush, Hush) got it. Sam and Grace from the Wolves of Mercy Falls got it. Even HARRY FREAKING POTTER and his Love Interest, plus his two best friends, got it. So why the HELL couldn't Tris and Tobias have it?

Sometimes things happen in books and I say "You can't. You can't do that." Even though, of course, the author can. But it's just not fair. It's so damn unfair. Tris beat death so many times. She survived the simulations, the serums, the executions, the constant battles, the wounds, even freaking DEATH SERUM, and then bam, just like that, she's gone. I still don't want to accept it. Even though I knew she was dead, I still kept waiting for a chapter head to say TRIS instead of TOBIAS. I still waited for it even when the chapters were no longer marked because it's wasn't necessary to differentiate anymore. These books--aside from Allegiant, when Tobias gets a POV, and HMMM, I WONDER WHY--are Tris Prior's story. It's over 1000 pages of her thoughts and her words and her life. And now she's gone and it just freaking sucks because SHE WAS NEVER SUPPOSED TO DIE. You don't expect THE Main Character, the person whose POV you read from--for over 1000 pages--to die. Why? Just, why? It ruins everything. I can't look at the damn book, the Book That Shall Not Be Named. I don't even want to use anything associated with her world, I don't want to feel like I'm Dauntless when I wear all black.

The death of Tris Prior puts a damper on the entire trilogy. I'm going to share my thoughts on the book minus Tris's death later, but right now her death is the talk because it's all I can think about it when I think of that book and, well, just about anything. (I was reading a book and it had the word "fortress" and I just, I had to stop myself from crying.) I loved Divergent and Insurgent. They were really, really good books. But now they're ruined because of Allegiant. I don't know that I could ever read them again. I don't see them the same way anymore, now that I know the outcome. (Gosh damn it, I just keep picturing Tris dead, usually on the table, and it sucks.) I'm pretty sure there's no way in hell I'm going to reread Allegiant, and I don't know how the movie is going to go. This ONE book ruins all the others. It changes everything. And that completely, totally, utterly SUCKS.

The worst part about Tris Prior dying is that Tris Prior is dead. When she died, I cried, though I was still hoping she'd come back, she'd be okay, that some kind of magic would bring her back, but that kind of stuff doesn't exist in dystopian novels. I really started crying, though, when Tobias found out and from then on out. You see, when a character dies, they DIE. At the end of most books, I can imagine and picture what the characters might be doing right now, what they might be doing in ten years. But with Tris Prior dying, I can't picture it. I can't picture anything. The imagination stopped, my mind won't let it happen. (I had such troubles sleeping that night after I finished it. It just feels so real. And my mind kept making up its own scenes, I think just with Tobias and with Tris still dead, and I hated it.) I can't picture Tris Prior and Tobias Eaton in their Happily Ever After, that thing they worked so hard for and were so DAMN CLOSE to getting before it was torn from them. I don't necessarily regret reading the books, but I am so unhappy with how Allegiant is making me feel and I just want the book to end with Tris and Tobias alive and happy and together. Is that so much to ask? It is so hard to ask that the FourTris be left standing? Because Veronica Roth took the FourTris down and it's left everything in ruins.

I don't handle death well. I don't. It terrifies me, and I don't have much experience with it. So when a character--especially a big one--I can feel it. And with Tris Prior, I really feel it. It just feels so real, because to me fictional characters ARE real. This may be worse than how I felt after reading The Fault in Our Stars--it's constantly on my mind, my stomach hurts and I'm not eating much, I don't feel good, etc. I just wish, I really, really wish, that Allegiant would've ended differently. Not just because I'm upset--which I am--but because it's ruined the first two books (and probably the movie) for me. I've seen some things Veronica said about the book (but not everything because hello, emotions), but I just don't see it and agree. Yes, Tris learned how to be selfless and she did a very selfless act. But did she have to die doing it? No, I don't think she did.

Is it weird that I want to know where she was shot? Because I do. And when her mom showed up I totally gasped, then I realized she wasn't actually THERE, and then Tris grabbed her mom's hand and NO, TRIS, DON'T GO WITH YOUR MOM. And Tobias, poor, poor Tobias. And the ashes? UGH. If Allegiant gets made into a movie I'm going to be destroyed. Can I just forget I read this book and that that happened? Please?

So, long story short: I am very upset that Tris died, I don't think it was necessary, and I am not taking it well.

Now, onto the rest of the book.

Even without Tris's death, Allegiant is not my favorite book of the trilogy. In fact, it's at the bottom by a lot. I loved the first two and thought they were GREAT, but Allegiant fell really short. Problem number one was that it felt different. If you were to put Divergent and Allegiant next to each other, they don't match up or go together--they both seem so totally different. I didn't like all the newness in Allegiant. And while things happened, I kept waiting for something to happen. I think I was kind of bored and it was kind of slow for the first half of the book. Maybe part of it was the hype--hello, everyone's talking about it and it's the ending to a huge series--but I didn't really love it.

Also, this book was full of tension and frustrations. Something that went through my head at one point (and I'll admit, I was trying to be witty): "FourTris is falling down, falling down, falling down, FourTris is falling down, and SOMEONE BETTER FIX IT." Because if Four and Tris are not together then things are not okay. But we all know how that ended. (I could've lived with a breakup. But death? I'm not liking it.) Because Tobias and Tris were fighting throughout the book, we didn't get a whole lot of their sweet little moments, which stunk, because I love their little moments. But...

THEY DID THE DEED. I was pretty sure it was going to happen (and of course, before one of them died, so tragic), and I am happy it did. Although I'm bummed that's all they really got, because those two, after everything they'd been through--which was a LOT--deserved a Happily Ever After. And I just thought that it was SO CUTE when Tobias lifted Tris over his shoulders and brought her to the couch. SO CUTE. And he kissed her stomach and said "beautiful!" (And I know this sounds wrong, so sue me, but was Tris wearing a bra under her shirt? Because it makes a difference people. It does.) (Yes, I know I'm being pervy.)

So Tris and Tobias get a few moments of happiness, but it's not enough. We lose a few other characters, of course: Edward and Tori, who I didn't really care about, but Uriah I did care about. His death was sad, and his ashes--just UGH. At the end of the book, there were so few people left that were there in the beginning that it was just plain sad. So much death in these books.

I did not like the new characters, for the most part. (Like I said, it was all just so different.) David seemed kind of sketch--and look, he was! I guessed that he had a crush on Natalie Prior, though. And Nita just needed to go. Why couldn't she have gone into the Weapons Room instead of Tris? Speaking of Weapons Room...I didn't want Caleb to go in there and die, but I would've chosen him over Tris. (Also, there's some kind of sick irony that Ansel Elgort's character dies in The Fault in Our Stars but lives in Allegiant and that Shailene Woodley's character dies in Allegiant and lives in The Fault in Our Stars.) I didn't mind Matthew, or Christina and Cara, for that matter. But am I the only person who got vibes of Tris/Matthew and Tobias/Nita or Tobias/Cara? Because there were points where I thought those could be possibilities. Actually, there were several things that were suggestive in the book that made me think things could happen, like foreshadowing.

One more thing about the death of Beatrice Prior: The end. The whole thing with the zip lining and the ashes...it just broke my heart. And Tobias. TOBIAS broke my heart. He lost his love--he and Tris were supposed to be TOGETHER FOREVER. How many couples got a happy ending in this book? So few. So very few. And is Tobias and Christina a thing? Because I'm not sure I like that.

I know I'm forgetting something. (I know what you're thinking: Rachel, you wrote a long-ass review, how the hell could you have forgotten anything?) But with books like this, I want to get every thought down. And writing this review...I feel like once I hit PUBLISH, that's it. It's the last hurrah. The Divergent trilogy really is over. (I'm getting butterflies right now.) I don't even know how to rate this freaking book. Sometimes I post these "goodbye" gifs at the end of a review for a series finale, but for some reason that just doesn't fit here. Maybe because it doesn't feel like it's over. Maybe because I didn't love Allegiant. Maybe because I'm so distraught and unaccepting to the ending. But I will say this:

Do you feel as broken down as I do? Please say yes. Please say I'm not the only person who gets like this over books and fictional characters.

Don't ever say books mean nothing. Don't ever say characters aren't real. Because to me, books DO mean something. Characters ARE real. And if that wasn't the case, I wouldn't be hit so hard--like a freaking train hit me--from the death of a character. Is that real enough for you? Because it should be.

Dear Veronica Roth,
I don't understand why you did some of the things you did in Allegiant, and, gosh, I wish you hadn't, because I just HATE how it makes me feel and I want that feeling to go away so. bad. But I'd also like to thank you. While I'm sorry I didn't love Allegiant and that it, personally, ruined the trilogy for me, I still want to thank you. You created a fantastic world full of characters that I love. You made great books. And you took such big risks. I'm trying to be brave with the series ending, but it's hard.
And so I say, Thank You.
Sincerely,
Rachel Patrick

Rest in Peace to every single character who died in this series, most especially to the kickass and badass Beatrice "Tris" Prior. I'm going to miss you. Gosh, I'm going to miss you.

So...I think that's it?

Does anyone have a tissue?

Did I like it? Yes. With one major exception.

Did I love it? I hate to say this, but I don't think so.

Would I reread it? I don't think I could handle it.

Would I purchase it? Already have it. (And I don't like looking at it.)

Who would I recommend it to? People who loved the first two books; those who want to read a fantastic trilogy; people who are okay with their hearts being ripped out.