Four – by Veronica Roth

14 07 2025

So while the Divergent books were technically a trilogy, the author wrote a fourth book, giving a bit of backstory to the male lead (called Four), since the first two books of the trilogy were told purely from Tris’ perspective. It’s told as four short stories, and three mini chapters, though the short stories flow fairly well chronologically anyway. That said, I wouldn’t suggest reading this if you haven’t read the trilogy first, as there’s definitely some assumed knowledge! (And don’t think the films will be enough, I watched them recently and the plot seemed to veer right away from the books!)

I enjoyed the stories that were set before the trilogy starts, but once it got to those that overlap, I just felt like I was reading something I’d already read, I didn’t feel like his perspective added a tonne to it. If you’ve read the trilogy it’s worth a quick read through, but I wouldn’t rave about it.

One line though that I thought was worth sharing: “Dead people can be our heroes because they can’t disappoint us later; they only improve over time, as we forget more and more about them.”


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Allegiant – by Veronica Roth

21 06 2025

This finishes the initial trilogy – there’s a separate fourth book that ties in, which I’ll get to at some point.

I was less keen on this when it started, as while the first two books are told from the perspective of the female protagonist, this one alternates between her and the male protagonist as the narrator, which was quite off putting initially, took a lot of concentration and flicking back to check who was talking to begin with.

In this book we go outside the city that’s been the setting for the first two, and there are shocking revelations about the origin of the city that’s been their home. There’s an awful lot going on with plot, which occasionally got a little confusing, but generally just kept attention, with the second half of the book being really gripping.

The only thing that annoyed me a bit about it was the relationship between the 2 main characters in that so many times it seemed if one of them was upset, it would just be resolved with a passionate kiss – there was a lot about the impact of the kissing, it was a bit grating after a while.

But it’s a trilogy I’ve enjoyed, and I’ll read Four at some point, which, I think, is a series of stories from our male lead’s perspective.

I watched the first 2 films as I reread, but having finished this, it seems the films have now disappeared from iPlayer, which is a shame. Plus this book was meant to be split into two films, but they never made the second, so it’d be left open anyway!


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