Divergent by Veronica Roth

Oh my gosh.  This series is right up there with The Hunger Games.  No lie.

In future Chicago, there are 5 factions, each dedicated to a particular virtue.  Candor (Honesty), Abnegation (Selflessness), Dauntless (Bravery), Amity (Peacefulness), and Erudite (Intelligence).  Beatrice Prior, and her brother Caleb have grown up in Abnegation, and at age 16, are preparing to choose which faction they will spend the rest of their lives in.  To aid in this decision, every 16-year-old must undergo an aptitude test to discover what factions they are eligible for.  Most people only have one answer, but Beatrice is told she has aptitude for three different factions: Abnegation, Dauntless, and Erudite.  Her test administrator tells her to never mention this, as "Divergence" is an extremely dangerous.  The day comes, and both Caleb and Beatrice abandon their family to join different factions.  Caleb chooses Erudite, and Beatrice chooses Dauntless.  As Beatrice begins a grueling initiation into Dauntless, she renames herself Tris and works harder than ever to join Dauntless as a full-fledged member.  She and the other transfer initiates quickly sort themselves out, and among the enemy is Peter, a violent transfer from Candor, who will do anything, including stabbing a fellow initiate in the eye with a butter knife.  As Tris proves herself worthy of membership in Dauntless, she catches the eye of the attractive trainer, Four.  Four takes Tris through his fear landscape and she realizes that he is the son of Marcus, a leader of the Abnegation faction, and that his real name is Tobias.  The two pursue a romantic relationship, and together discover that the Erudite representative has hatched a plot to destroy the Abnegation and take over the government of the factions.  She uses simulation serum to control the minds of the Dauntless and kill the Abnegation, except for the fact that the simulation serum is ineffective on the Divergent.  Tris and Tobias are captured and taken to Jeanine, the Erudite leader.  Tobias is injected with a new serum that controls his divergent mind, and Tris is taken to a chamber that replicates one of her fears.  She is to be executed, but at the last moment, her mother comes to her rescue and frees her.  They travel to a safe house to get extra help from her father and brother, but her mother is killed trying to protect her.  Tris, Caleb, their father, and Marcus go to Dauntless headquarters to destroy the simulation controller and to rescue Tobias when they meet Peter along the way.  Tris shoots Peter in the shoulder to threaten him and then takes him along with them.  When she gets to Dauntless headquarters, she discovers that Tobias has been controlled to believe that his friends are enemies.  Because he is divergent, the serum does not have as great an effect on his mind, and Tris is able to wake him up.  She witnesses her father being murdered on one of the monitors and has a renewed reason to destroy the simulation controller.  Tris, Tobias, Caleb, Marcus, and Peter hop onto a train and make their way to a hiding place in a different faction's headquarters, prepared to reenter the war.
This is so good!  Oh my goodness, I was so hooked.  There's the romance between Tris and Tobias, which keeps you on your toes and totally gave me butterflies.  And the action!!!! There's so much going on and so much to talk about (and fangirl over, if that's your thing) that you won't be able to put Divergent down!
As another addition to the new string of dystopian fantasy novels that have hit shelves this past year, you may be thinking that it's not worth picking up, it's just another bandwagon novel piggybacking on the fame of The Hunger Games.  To an extent, Roth is riding that wave, but her writing is so authentic and amazing, that Divergent is in a class of it's own.  Using a 1st Person Limited point of view is incredibly difficult, because you don't get that aspect of "this happened to me and now I'm telling the story" but it's very much like you're tracking with the characters thoughts at the moment.  This is a common element in all the recent dystopian novels, and is a trademark characteristic that has made them so popular with both young adult readers, as well as those looking to analyze what makes these novels so popular.  I truly do encourage you to pick this one up, because it is so good!  It is part of a series, and I've also read it's sequel, which I will be posting about next.  I really think you'll enjoy this debut novel from Veronica Roth.

Teaser Quote: “Becoming fearless isn't the point. That's impossible. It's learning how to control your fear, and how to be free from it.” -Tobias "Four" Eaton

Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, Pt. 2

Okay, here is the (maybe) long-awaited part 2 review.  I also have 2 more coming at you this afternoon.

Scarlett O'Hara is now desperate to save Tara from being taken over by Yankee carpetbaggers, so she travels to Atlanta again to convince Rhett to marry her and give her money for upkeep and taxes on the plantation.  She arrives in Atlanta, accompanied by Mammy, only to find Rhett in prison for murdering a free negro.  He is set to be hanged, and Scarlett gives up and pursues Frank Kennedy, betrothed to her sister Suellen.  Soon, Frank and Scarlett marry and Scarlett begins to delve into Frank's business practices.  While reviewing the books on Frank's general store, Rhett Butler, newly liberated, comes in and loans Scarlett the money to purchase a lumber mill, which becomes wildly successful in restoration-era Atlanta.  Scarlett soon becomes pregnant with her 2nd child.  Very late in her pregnancy, Scarlett gets word from Will Benteen that Gerald has died.  When she travels back to Tara, she finds that Suellen attempted to get Gerald to sign an oath of allegiance to the Union.  Gerald momentarily came back to himself and rode away on a horse.  While attempting to jump a high fence, Gerald's last words are "Ellen, watch me take this one!".  Scarlett arranges the funeral details and learns that Carreen, her youngest sister, is leaving for a convent in Charleston and Suellen and Will Benteen are getting married.  After the funeral, Scarlett learns that Ashley has accepted a banking job in the North, and as an attempt to get closer to him, offers him the foreman job in a second mill that she has purchased.  Melanie forces him to accept and the three of them go back to Atlanta together.  Shortly thereafter, Scarlett gives birth to a daughter, Ella Lorena.  When she is back making her rounds, a Yankee scallawag and a free negro attack her on the side of the road, and upon hearing about it, Ashley and Frank, members of the Ku Klux Klan, go after the men.  Ashley is injured in the raid and Frank is killed, with several other men almost getting jailed.  As Rhett escorts Scarlett home from Melanie and Ashley's home, Rhett professes his love for Scarlett and asks her to marry him.  Scarlett accepts and Rhett travels to Europe to purchase a ring and do business.  They honeymoon in New Orleans and upon returning, realize that the only friends that approve of them are Yankee carpetbaggers, having lost the approval of all but Melanie and Ashley of the Old Guard.  Scarlett continues to run the mills, but soon becomes pregnant.  She gives birth to a daughter named Eugenie Victoria, nicknamed "Bonnie Blue" Butler.  Bonnie is Rhett and Scarlett's one great tie in their deteriorating marriage.  Rhett makes a great effort to get back in good social standings with the Old Guard for Wade, Ella, and Bonnie's sake.  Scarlett and Rhett continue to fight all the time, and finally, Rhett takes Bonnie and travels to New Orleans.  When he returns, Scarlett and Rhett fight which causes Scarlett to accidentally fall down the stairs and miscarry the baby she had just told Rhett about.  Rhett is sick with worry and talks to Melanie about how much he loves Scarlett.  She is fine, and they go back to their old fights. Bonnie learns to jump a horse, and in an attempt to jump a high fence, she dies with the last words "Mother, watch me take this one!".  With the final tie between Rhett and Scarlett gone, they lose it, and Scarlett decides to take Wade and Ella back to Tara.  She is soon called back to Atlanta by Rhett.  Melanie has miscarried a child and is dying, and her parting demands of Scarlett are to take care of Ashley and Beau, and to be kind to Rhett, "as he loves you so...".  Scarlett soon realizes that she does not love Ashley, and instead has fallen in love with Rhett.  She tells him and he rejects her, saying that he has given up on her.  Neither want a divorce, so Rhett enforces a seperation.  Scarlett and the children travel back to Tara and she says that she will think about it all the next day because "tomorrow is another day".
Whew.  That is a monster book.  I do really encourage it because it contains so many characters that you love to love as well as love to hate.  Scarlett, Rhett, Melanie, and Ashley grow so much and the climax of the book illustrates that growth, as well as how they all need each other to survive the monstrous things that happen to them in the second half of this book.
I actually had to read this book for my AP Lit class, and I'm not going to bore you with the excessive details that I had to put in my reduction assignment, but I really do encourage you to, when you read it, pay attention to the details, motifs, and patterns that occur, not only because it would make you a more intelligent and better reader, but because they're very interesting and they add greatly to the story as a whole.
If you're after a classic, Gone with the Wind will take you minimum 3 months.  Maybe shorter, but seriously 1448 pages, and you're golden.

Teaser Quote: “I was never one to patiently pick up broken fragments and glue them together again and tell myself that the mended whole was as good as new. What is broken is broken - and I'd rather remember it as it was at its best than mend it and see the broken places as long as I lived. ” -Rhett Butler