Art by Sammi Kwok

As hard as Veronica Roth may try, her books can’t escape the audience’s insistence to label the series as the next Hunger Games. Roth’s debut novel, Divergent, was an original twist on an age old concept, dystopian societies, and had me waiting, and ready to devour the next book—Insurgent, which, I admit was a disappointment. Nevertheless, I waited patiently for the third, Allegiant, which is told from the dual perspective of Beatrice Prior who refers to herself as Tris, and Tobias Eaton, better known as “Four.”

In Divergent, readers are introduced to future Chicago, where people are separated into five factions which symbolize a specific characteristic; Candor (the honest), Abnegation (the selfless), Dauntless (the brave), Amity (the peaceful), and Erudite (the intelligent). Allegiant, however, unfolds in the Chicago where the factions are destroyed and Evelyn, Four’s mother emerges as the ruler. However, she turns out to be yet another tyrant who attempts to force her views onto a world shattered by the knowledge that they are but a tiny, broken society where another world awaits outside the fence. But Tris, Four, and the rising movement dubbed the Allegiant want to find life outside the fence, and what awaits them

Roth attempts and fails to emulate the Hunger Games by trying to shock the audience by killing her characters in mass. The killings are so frequent that they sacrifice any significance death once had in the book. Not only that, but the protagonists’ escape from Chicago seems convenient and clumsily put together. A whole chunk of the book was sacrificed to explain the new society that the protagonists have been flung into yet it never felt believable.

Another disappointment was the character development, Tobias, once strong and mysterious now seems to be too sensitive and weak. The relationship development could have also used some work because the romance between Four and Triss seems forced despite their fiery and physical relationship.

The book in itself isn’t awful, but Roth is trying to shove too many ideas into one book, and ends up with a mediocre story and a confusing plot. The ending of the novel is particularly shocking, but the readers who have followed Triss will enjoy the closure and the action packed novel from the beginning to the very end.