Insurgent: A Watery YA Sequel

Because I preordered the third installment of the Divergent trilogy, Allegiant, and I knew I would receive it around October 22nd, I wanted to read the 2nd book in the series, Insurgent.  The first book, Divergent, introduced a fantasy world constructed with the teenage girl audience in mind.  Lots of kissing, lots of breathless moments of the hot leader protecting the not so pretty, but really determined heroine, Tris.  The world itself was imaginative enough to hold my interest with the five factions- Dauntless, Amity, Candor, Erudite, and Abnegation (which oddly all seem to be dominated by teenagers with the exception of a few adult leaders), and the gutsy Dauntless initiation rituals.  When the faction inspired war began by the end of the first book, my interest waned a bit, but I still wanted to continue on to the 2nd and ultimately the 3rd book in the series.

Admittedly, Sci-Fi / Fantasy books are not my thing.  I love it, though, when a new author creates something that people love to read enough that they start buzzing about it.  Because a Divergent movie is in the not too distant future and the 3rd book was just released, I wanted to read this series to have an opinion.

Unfortunately, Insurgent, the 2nd book in the Divergent trilogy,  is a fluffy read - hardly any substance but teeming with an overabundance of teenage relationship angsty moments in the midst of a war that seems watery itself.  Tris just seems stupid to me in the 2nd installment, and Tobias (Four) also comes off as a jerk - moody, aloof, and then mushy all at once.  He lost his hard, edgy, mystique from the first book, and comes across more like a controlling boyfriend.

I found myself skimming pages, and wanting the inner dialogue of Tris and her self esteem issues to end as quickly as possible.  Rather than showing her fearless side, in this book, we see more of her Divergent tendencies, but they are all overridden by her attachment to Tobias.  I found the capture and torture of her rather boring, and the plans and attack strategies contrived and a bit cliche.  It really wasn't until the very end of this book that I felt mildly entertained and even considered picking up the 3rd book.

I know most teenage girls will completely disagree with me, and anyone who fell in love with the first book probably LOVED the second book, but now I need to either wade through my murky 2nd book emotions or scrap the series with one more book to go.

I've never been a quitter, so I vow to give Veronica Roth one more chance.  Right now she is 50/50 in my book, so maybe Allegiant will change my mind and tip my book scales more in her favor.