Divergent Is Thriving
Divergent, written by Veronica Roth, was published by HarperCollins Children’s Books in 2011. It is a young-adult dystopian novel set in the so-called Divergent Universe that explores the life of teenage girl living in a dystopian world. On March 21, 2014, the screenplay version of the novel premiered.
The film grossed $4.9 million in the late night premiere. The film grossed $22.8 million in United States including the Thursday night premiere gross. Internationally, it grossed $1.7 million from four territories, with a worldwide total of $56,307,747.
Kendall Bennett, a sophomore at AHS, says, “I read all the books in the series and my favorite of them is Divergent. I really liked the idea of the faction system and the calm before the storm that was presented. I liked this because you know that something big is coming, but you are not sure what exactly it will be. Also, the love story makes me so happy.”
Divergent is a series of three novels all focusing on the different factions of the society the characters live in. This book allows readers to decipher the factions into what they want to see them as. Each faction has different aspects making them each unique. Some readers may hate one way of a faction but love a different one. This is a way for readers to be able to explore their imaginations they may have not known they possessed.
Maddie Sorenson, a sophomore at AHS says, “A couple of my friends had read the series and told me about them. The storyline sounded really interesting and I found that I actually love the books. Divergent, the first book of the series, had me hooked with the first page.”
The Divergent series is read mostly by teens, but it has been found that Mrs. Sadowski, Ms. Miller, and Mrs. Hechimovich at AHS have much excitement about the book as well. Students and teachers often find themselves off topic in the classroom discussing the storyline of the book and how intrigued it had them as readers. With teachers enjoying the series, students are hoping that in future years, the series may be read in classrooms.
Sorenson says, “It took me three days to finish the first two books because I could not put them down. If these books were read in the classroom, I believe teachers would find positive results from their students. This would be a complete different feel from books we have read in our English classes before, so it could be really awesome to experiment in a class.”
Divergent has been compared to other dystopian based books like The Hunger Games, The Host, and The Maze Runner. All of the books are parts of series that have been a huge hit in the past three years. Like Divergent, The Hunger Games and The Host have also been turned into movies.
