. . . what is the Death Serum?

I just noticed on my blog statistics that there's usually at least one person somewhere in the world that is on this blog. So, you, yes, YOU--I have a question for you. But only if you've read Allegiant.
Is the Death Serum just poison? Because I know that it sounds so cool in the book. DEATH SERUM. But isn't is just poison? Wouldn't they at least have the same effects? The Death Serum kills you and poison kills you . . .
Just a thought.

A-Z Marathon! Author of the Day: Veronica Roth

We already had an Author of the Day today, but in the future, nobody will notice.
It also doesn't matter. "Author of the Day" just sounds catchier than "A post about a certain author because I haven't finished reading The 5th Wave yet, and I kind of want to maintain an audience by posting daily, but this might not be posted daily, so don't get your hopes up."

You might know Veronica Roth because she wrote the Divergent trilogy. And you may not know that Four, a Divergent collection, will be coming out pretty soon.

For those of you who don't know, Divergent is a relatively new dystopian trilogy about a girl named Tris. Her society is separated into 5 factions, and when you turn 16, you get to choose which faction you want to live in for the rest of your life. So, she has a pretty tough decision because she doesn't fit into one faction. She is divergent.

Now, here's the thing about Veronica Roth's writing:
-I think that she is more of storyteller than a writer. I'll explain. This isn't at all an insult towards Veronica Roth. I just think that there's a difference. A writer is someone who I think creates very thought-provoking work, and every sentence is well articulated. I think that a storyteller is someone who takes you on this wild and fun and exciting adventure through words (or pictures, but not in this case). Veronica Roth can definitely write. She seems to have a pretty good vocabulary, her sentences are pretty, and there are some things in her writing that did make me think and consider the possibilities. But Divergent, more than anything, is a fast paced, kickass story with cool characters in a cool world and a cool concept. What I'm trying to say is that her writing is not a work of genius. It's not a very deep series. There are messages in the books, but it's kind of lost with the whole awesome-heroine-trying-to-stay-alive thing. It's pretty fun to read, though, and they make for cool movies.
-Oh, the plot holes. You can find plot holes in almost any work of writing. Without them, most stories would have no climaxes or satisfying resolutions, and writers would have immense writer's block. But the plot holes in this series are a bit lavish. Now, I didn't really notice them when I first read the series. I whipped through the series in under 3 weeks. During the time I was reading, I wasn't thinking very much. I never stopped to think "Hmm . . . that isn't like Tris's character . . ." or "What? That makes no sense!" But as soon as I was finished and I started speculating the books, I realized some things. I don't want to say much, but Allegiant is just kind of one big plot hole.
-No love triangles! A little refreshing in YA.

Overall, her writing is exciting, but don't speculate it while you're reading it if you want to enjoy the series. If you want to write an intelligent review, speculate all you want.

A-Z Marathon! Characters from Books: Peter Hayes

**Many, many Divergent, Insurgent and Allegiant spoilers. You have officially been warned.

Peter . . .
Not a very friendly guy.
Anyone who stabs someone's eye with a butter knife and tries to pretty much rape and kill a girl is generally not friendly. He constantly calls Tris a stiff and she shoots him.
In Insurgent, Peter acts less douchey. Yeah, he takes the disk, and Tris beats him up for it which leads to the funniest chapter ever, but he's still less douchey. I feel like he gained some respect for Tris.
And yeah, he saved Tris's life, which almost made me like him for a second. Then he ruined it by explaining his reasons for saving her.
In Allegiant, he makes friends with Caleb. Cool, I guess. Then, Peter just decides to erase his memory and forget he was a douche. The best thing he's done in the entire trilogy.
I just realized that the Divergent fandom is really lazy with their memes, so we only have two today.

Books to Burn: Allegiant by Veronica Roth

**To view spoilers, drag your mouse over the empty space between"<SPOILER>...<SPOILER>"

I'm actually not going to burn this book because it looks too pretty on my bookshelf, so . . .
For those of you who don't know what Allegiant is, it is the final book in the Divergent trilogy. The first book, Divergent, was great, even though it's not really a book I would typically read. I think I enjoyed the second book, Insurgent, more. Allegiant was a bit of a let down, though.

The book was poised to be super awesome with lots of action, but it wasn't. I have nothing wrong with an author not writing a traditional "hero saves the day and has a happily ever after" book, but I just didn't enjoy this book.

<SPOILER> I didn't have a problem with Tris dying. It was kind of a meaningless death, but I don't think that's where the author made her flaw. I think the flaw was with the whole genetic damage and genetic purity thing. If genetic damage doesn't actually really affect someone, then why would there be a one hundred year war about it? Honestly. World War I and II didn't last that long. I just found so many elements in the book confusing and weird and unnecessary. Everyone is so sad that Tris died, but that honestly made the book slightly better for me. The author didn't do the traditional thing. I wish I could say it surprised me, but someone spoiled me while I was reading Insurgent. But I imagine that if I found it out on my own, I would have liked it. It made the book more interesting and less predictable. <SPOILER>

One thing that I didn't like about the book is how the author executed having two POVs (points of view). I couldn't tell the two voices apart, which really bothered me. I would be reading and suddenly Tris would be taking about how beautiful she is, and then I would have to reread the chapter from Tobias's point of view, which annoyed me.

So, this book wasn't completely terrible. I had to finish it to get some sort of resolution, though. The epilogue is beautiful, though. I thought that was a terrific way to wrap up the book. However, I wasn't a fan of most of the stuff before that . . .

I did enjoy most of the series, though. It was interesting. I don't say I would regret reading it. I just feel like this book wasn't as amazing as I wanted it to be.