Divergent, a fast-paced science fiction thriller by Veronica Roth that takes place in a futuristic totalitarian society, is about a sixteen year old girl named Beatrice Prior, later known as Tris. She used to live a noble, respectful, and unadventurous life in the faction Abnegation. In this warped society factions are the way the government separates communities of people by their emotions and personalities. To decide upon this, they place the citizens into a deep simulated sleep induced by drugs, they then place scenarios into the contestant's head to examine how the initiate acts. This test is called the Aptitude Test. Newborns are immediately placed into the faction of their parents, but as the sixteenth year of life comes around, the Aptitude Test must be performed, and in Tris' case, her test results were inconclusive, meaning she has no exact faction given to her while she was in the simulation. Therefore, the government classifies her as Divergent. This is Tris' dilemma. The inquiry question my reading club developed, based upon the books we are reading individually, is how does the main character overcome and deal with his/her conflict throughout the story?Tris' conflict, being a Divergent, is that it is very risky and dangerous because Divergent's have no rightful place in society. To cover up this treacherous situation, from the world in which she lives, she chooses a faction she thinks will divert attention from this perilous fate. At the Choosing Ceremony, when one's desired faction becomes reality, the chosen faction must be honored, and the initiate will train hard to their fulfill their potential and take their rightful place in society. They are ranked based on how well they train in comparison to everyone else in the faction. Firstly, Tris chose Dauntless, the faction of the brave, hoping to hide her true nature. She surprises everyone, even herself, by being so brave for a "stiff", what the Dauntless call people from Abnegation, people of selflessness. Secondly, to enter this realm of the undaunted, two death defying obstacles lie in the initiates path. The first interference to be overcome is to jump out of a full speed moving train and onto a building five feet away with a ten story drop above solid rough concrete pavement. The next obstacle takes a lot of guts, lots and lots of guts. She has to jump off the same building and into a decent sized abyss, not knowing what awaits her on the bottom. Impressively, she was the first jumper and this took attention away from her sketchy personality that could potentially give away the fact she is a Divergent. Another way Tris covers her identity is by beating up Molly, a mean and nasty bully. This act of brutality and anger, not only sent a message to Molly and her cronies, but also showed the Dauntless leaders that she is not worth nothing and they should never give up on her, "I may have underestimated you Stiff" the head leader Eric says to Tris, finally accepting her for the first time. This incident proves that she is finally able to fit into Dauntless and effectively hide who she really is.
I relate Tris Prior and the Divergent story to Katniss Everdeen and the Hunger Games Trilogy. Both of these tales include heroic teenage girls that live in futuristic Sci-Fi worlds. Both have trouble conforming to their controlling and dictator like societies. I have only read half of Divergent thus far and do not have any knowledge of the end, however, the strength shown by Beatrice leads me to believe that she will start a rebellion just as Katniss did in Catching Fire. These two characters are strong and will fight to the end to achieve what they believe is right for a better society. They are cool.
