All posts tagged Veronica Roth

Chosen Ones

By Brookelorren on 1 Comment
The Chosen Ones cover

What do you do for the rest of your life after you save the world? I recently had the chance to read Chosen Ones by Veronica Roth, which explores this question. It is her first adult book. While it was good, I don’t think it had quite the same magic as Divergent (which, after reading page 50, I finished, along with Insurgent and Allegiant, in two days).

Alternate Universes

Chosen Ones takes place in an alternate Earth. I thought this was a pretty cool concept, and think that so many interesting stories could be told this way. It is a little confusing at first, as it covers a time period that I lived through and–I don’t remember a monster called The Dark One invading the earth and almost destroying it. When you get to part 2 of this book, it makes even more sense.

Characters

Sloane, the main character, is suffering from PTSD. She was one of the Chosen Ones that saved the world 10 years ago, and she has never truly recovered and moved on with life. Her boyfriend, Matthew, another Chosen One, happily meets with people and is your typical extrovert. Esther, another Chosen One, has turned into an Insta! superstar. Perhaps the only person that seems to get her is Albie.

I don’t personally connect with Sloane as much as, say, I connected with Tris. I think some people will though.

Story

About a third of the way through the book, something happens where they have to save the world again. I can’t say too much without being spoilery. Sloane isn’t really happy with this–didn’t she already serve her time? Things are not exactly as they seem though. As the story progresses, we find out the truth, Sloane begins to make peace with her life, and of course… there’s a resolution, which I also can’t give away without being spoilery.

Conclusion

Chosen Ones is a fairly unique book. There are a lot of things I really liked about this book. I didn’t like this quite as much as I liked the Divergent and Carve the Mark series–there wasn’t a FourTris or Akos and Cyra that really drew me in, and that might be part of it. Although both Cyra and Sloane were characters that had been through trauma and were trying to deal with it, Cyra had Akos, and while Sloane wasn’t exactly alone, the book spends most of its internal focus on Sloane battling her demons, and there wasn’t as much of a connection to the people around her.

If you like Veronica Roth’s other books, read her other books and wish there was less emphasis on the romantic relationships but otherwise liked the books, or maybe would like a sci-fi book with very little romance in it, you might like Chosen Ones. I did like it. although I’m unlikely to be obsessive over it like I was with Divergent.

Ark

By Brookelorren on Leave a Comment
Ark cover

If you’ve read my blog for a while, then you might know that Veronica Roth is one of my auto-buy authors. Chosen Ones, her adult debut that’s coming out next April, has been on my TBR for over a year now (and I’ve already pre-ordered it). So how the heck did I not know that she released a short story on Amazon nearly a month ago? You would have thought I would have heard about it before its release date. Nevertheless, I saw an ad for it on Goodreads today and I immediately had to start reading it.

Samantha is one of the last people living on Earth. An asteroid is set to hit our planet in only a few weeks. She’s a plant scientist working to save as many plant species as possible before the final ship leaves Earth for good. It’s all sort of a depressing premise, especially since they won’t reach the planet they’re headed for within their lifetimes.

I really liked the character of Samantha, as well as the older plant scientist, Hagen. Samantha’s friends weren’t as fleshed-out as they could have been, however. They weren’t the main focus of this story, but the story might have been a little better if we would have gotten to know them a little bit more.

“Ark” is a quiet story. There isn’t a lot of action like you might find in Divergent or Carve the Mark, but I liked it nevertheless. It’s not my favorite Veronica Roth short story (that honor would go to “Inertia”) but Samantha and her history grew on me. I like the twist she threw in at the end, which did give me a few “Inertia”-like vibes.

“Ark” is part of an anthology called the Forward collection. I may or may not read the others in the series. It can be borrowed for free if you have Kindle Unlimited, or you can buy it currently for $1.99.

The End and Other Beginnings

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The End and Other Beginnings cover

We finally got to October! The month itself isn’t particularly special to me; but it is the month that many of my most-anticipated books get released. The End and Other Beginnings was one of those books that I just had to have. It is a collection of six stories; three of them were published previously. Since these six stories vary, I will be reviewing all six stories separately.

Inertia

I first read “Inertia” in Summer Days and Summer Nights (link is to my review). I still love that story about as much as I did the first time I read it. This story will probably get the most rereads in this anthology. It’s a story about a girl whose former best friend is dying and they realize what they mean to each other.

The Spinners

“The Spinners” is a story about sisters. It’s also a story with aliens in it. I liked it, but not quite as much as “Inertia”.

Hearken

“Hearken” is a story where people naturally have a song, and these people called hearkeners are able to hear these songs. For some reason, hearkeners are revered in society. This is a world where evil people will set off bio-bombs in order to hasten the apocalypse. It had an interesting end.

Vim and Vigor

“Vim and Vigor” was a pretty cool story about friendship. Four friends bonded years ago over a group of female superheroes. Things happened, as some friendships do, and their friendship just isn’t the same. The ending was pretty sweet. If I was to rank the stories in The End and Other Beginnings, this one would be close to the top.

Armored Ones

“Armored Ones” contains two stories from the Carve the Mark universe. One is from Teka’s point of view, the other one is from Akos’s. While I knew there would be stories about Akos and Cyra in this book, I was kind of hoping that there would be stories that took place after The Fates Divide.

The Transformationist

“The Transformationist” is another story that takes place in the Carve the Mark universe, although it primarily takes place on Zold, with new characters. I enjoyed seeing a different part of the universe. The familiar planets and concepts brought me happiness.

While the last two stories take place in the Carve the Mark Universe, you can probably enjoy the story without reading the duology.

At 256 pages, The End and Other Beginnings was a quick read. I really liked it, and I’m sure I’ll be reading these stories again in the future. Three of these stories were previously published, so if you already have the original anthologies, you might be less inclined to get this book. If you haven’t read the Carve the Mark duology, you might still enjoy the last two stories, but you’ll appreciate them more if you’re familiar with that universe. At $15 for a hardback, it might not be worth the money if you already have her stories in previous anthologies and haven’t read Carve the Mark, but since I don’t have her previous anthologies and did read her duology, it was worth it to me.

One More October 1st Release to Get Excited About!

By Brookelorren on Leave a Comment

As if we didn’t already have enough to look forward to on October 1st, Veronica Roth is releasing a book that day too! The End and Other Beginnings is a book of short stories, which contains stories from the Carve the Mark Universe, “Inertia” (which was my favorite story from Summer Days and Summer Nights), and some other stories.

I thought we were going to have to wait until 2020 to read something else from her, but nope! I’m excited for this one too.

It’s already available for pre-order, although I just spent the remainder of my Amazon money on Rebel, so I have to wait a couple of days to buy this one. I’m so excited for this one though! I know what I’ll be doing October 1st and 2nd now (unless I happen to score a couple of ARCs on these).

Roth and Lu are my two auto-buy authors, so I’m really psyched!

I Loved The Fates Divide

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The Fates Divide coverThe Fates Divide is Veronica Roth’s sequel to Carve the Mark, which I reviewed last year.  I loved this entire duology.  Some people anxiously await the releases of new movies… other people (that would be me) anxiously await the releases of new books, counting the days until they arrive in the mail.  I pre-ordered this book months in advance and couldn’t wait until it was released.  I currently work as a self checkout host at Walmart — right before this book came out, there was a sign saying how many days until Easter, and I would add nine days every time I looked at the sign and would excitedly think to myself “that’s how many days until The Fates Divide comes out”.  I’m currently anxiously awaiting the release of Marie Lu’s Wildcard on September 18th (and her scheduled 2019 release Kingdom of Back) and Renée Ahdieh’s Smoke in the Sun on my daughter’s birthday (June 5th), but I digress.

I had to go to my kids’ homeschool coop in the morning, but as soon as I got home, I went straight to the mailbox (oh, and I was tracking the package’s progress to my mailbox for days before its arrival), got my book out, and started reading.  Aside from having to take my daughter to American Heritage Girls that evening, I didn’t stop reading that evening until I was finished.  I love that I don’t have to work on Tuesdays, because that’s when all the new books come out :-).

If you haven’t read Carve the Mark yet, don’t read on if you don’t want spoilers.

The Fates Divide follows Akos and Cyra as they fly off into the stars after they capture Eijeh and Ryzek.  Lazmet, Cyra and Ryzek’s father, was recently revealed to be alive, and they will have to put a stop to him; after all, Ryzek learned to be the cruel person that he was because of his father.  It is written in four POV’s: those of Akos, Cyra, Eijah, and Cisi.

Before I started reading this book, I was a little wary of how this duology was going to end, especially since the book has the tagline He’d die for her.  She’d kill for him.  I absolutely hate chapter 50 of Allegiant (and no, We Can Be Mended did not fix things for me), but I still love the Divergent series because the rest of the story is so good.  Before this book’s release date, I reread Carve the Mark 3 times (twice in English and once in Spanish) and mused over the fates that these characters have.  Is there any possible way for this story to turn out well? I thought to myself.

Fortunately, I’m very happy to say that this story did have a satisfying ending and did not leave me crying at 4 AM as I crawled into bed as Allegiant did.  There are a couple of twists in this book (one I kind of guessed could be a possibility of after I finished Carve the Mark, the other one that happens in chapter 2, surprised the heck out of me).  I was very happy with the direction that this book went in and I’m sure that most readers will too.

Although I loved this book overall, I didn’t really love the storyline with Cisi as much as I loved the storyline with Akos and Cyra.  Cisi’s POV chapters were an interesting side story, and they did contribute to the overall progression of the story, but I didn’t love her character as much as I love the characters of Akos and Cyra.  I didn’t really find Eijah’s chapters to be detracting.

The Fates Divide is definitely written for the older side of the YA audience.  I recently read The Weight of Feathers, and one of the readers commented about how he was disturbed by the scene where one of the characters was swimming topless in front of a boy that she liked because her bikini that she normally wore with her mermaid costume had been destroyed.  If that sort of scene disturbs you, then you should probably seek out Middle Grade books and avoid The Fates Divide for now.  Akos and Cyra do quite a bit more than kissing in this book, and some of the scenes are fairly descriptive.  I love their relationship, but it’s also part of what makes this book suitable for an older YA audience.

This is the kind of book that leaves me thinking about the characters after reading the book, and is one that I plan on rereading.  It is the kind of book that I might write fanfiction about (I actually did write a short fanfiction scene called Five Seasons Later the morning after I read the book; it contains spoilers for The Fates Divide, so don’t read it if you have not read the book yet).  I give this book a rating of 5/5 stars.

Veronica Roth Strikes Again with Carve the Mark

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Carve the Mark coverYesterday I was a really happy camper because I had worked late on Monday and Veronica Roth’s new book, Carve the Mark, had already arrived in my mailbox before I woke up.  Thank you mailman!  Of course, I was then up late yesterday finishing the book.

Many people that know me know that I absolutely adore Divergent.  The first time I read the book, it took me a few days to read the first 50 pages or so, but once I got to that point, I read the rest of that book AND the next two books in two days.  Then I read the entire series in Spanish.  I also have the first book in German and Russian.  At one point, I think I was the second best player in the world, of all time, in Divergent trilogy Quiz Up (I was the best player in the world in that game in a couple of different months… I’m currently the 3rd best player in the world of all time).

When I heard a year or two ago that Veronica Roth had been signed to write a sci-fi book about some characters in space, I was a little skeptical.  Is this going to be a Star Trek type book, and is it going to be any good?  I was going to have to read it anyway.

I love this book.  I will definitely be reading the rest of the books in this series when they come out (I believe that this is also supposed to be part of a trilogy).  Although the setting of this book is different, it still has a great plot, characters that you love (and some that you hate), and relationships that you are interested in.  Oh, and there’s a plot twist at the end of the book that leave you with theories… and leave you with wanting more.

The book is set in a universe that is quite unlike ours.  As a result, the first chapter introduced a lot of new vocabulary that took a while to get used to (there is a glossary in the back though).  If you feel that way about halfway through the first chapter, don’t put the book down!  After the first chapter, the fact that we were in a completely different universe with all different plants and ways of doing things didn’t seem so distracting, and I’m sure that as I read through the book a second time, it will all seem normal and I will see more things in the book.

I don’t want to give out any spoilers, but I will give out some basics.  In one part of the planet, we have Akos.  He’s from a well-off family that cares for each other in a fairly peaceful society.  On the other part of the planet, there’s Cyra, part of the royal family in a more warlike society.  Due to circumstances beyond their control, Akos and Cyra are forced to be a part of each other’s lives.  They find a way to work together when they find out that they have similar goals, even though on paper, they probably shouldn’t trust each other.  While that one-paragraph synopsis might not sound that exciting, the book is.

If you love Divergent, then you’re probably going to love Carve the Mark.  Even though the setting is different, people (or human-like people, at least) in Veronica Roth’s worlds are people no matter where you go.  Some are inherently ambitious and evil, others have that spark of good, and others are a little more complicated than that.  If you find out that you love both Divergent and Carve the Mark, you might also be interested in Marie Lu’s Legend and Young Elites series.  I may review those at a later date, but those are similar books (Legend is a distopian YA novel set in future Los Angeles, the Young Elites is a YA novel set in a different universe).  I may review those at a later date.

Get A FREE Copy of the Divergent Epilogue!

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We Can Be Mended, the Divergent EpilogueI’m a HUGE Divergent fan.  Veronica Roth could buy… something… with the money that I’ve spent on her products.  I own the entire series in English, the main trilogy in English and Spanish, and the first book in German and Russian as well.  I also have all of the movies that she’s released so far.  Being the huge Veronica Roth fan that I am, I have, of course, already pre-ordered her new book, Carve the Mark (of course I will be reviewing it here).

Did you know that Veronica Roth has created an epilogue to the Divergent Series?  AND you can get it for free?  There’s one catch though: you have to either buy Carve the Mark or pre-order it someplace.

I won an Amazon.com gift card in the last couple of days of last year, and I knew exactly what I would be spending it on: the new Veronica Roth book.  So I already have met the requirements to get this free book.  Yay!

So if you want to get the free We Can Be Mended book like me, you’ll first have to pre-order the book.  You can get it by clicking on this lovely Carve The Mark link that leads you to Amazon.com (and if you do, I thank you for supporting this blog), or the Amazon.com picture to the right..

Once you pre-order the book, you’ll want to follow the following link get the FREE We Can Be Mended Divergent epilogue.  You’ll need to submit a digital picture of your receipt, along with your address and basic contact info.  That’s it!

The free We Can Be Mended epilogue giveaway is sponsored by Epic Reads, which is a promotional service of Harper Collins Publishers.