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3.61 AVERAGE
3.61 AVERAGE
This book was incredible! Veronica Roth just nailed it the way she describes Sloane's PTSD. And now I love her writing all over again after loving Divergent so much.
This story begins as a tale of what happens to the heroes after they win the battle. They are celebrating (some are not so celebratory) the 10 year mark of the defeat of the Dark One. I loved this so much because, especially coming from Sloane's perspective, I feel like this is a very truthful look at this situation. Some moving forward and a few, like Sloane and Albie, are still having a very hard time. This book gives such an honest look at PTSD, it's just, WOW! Spot on.
However, this 10 year anniversary turns into a whole new shade of drama and Sloane (with a few other Chosen Ones) is right back in the middle of a fight... this time, it's against the Resurrectionist. Nothing is really as it seems, even Sloane. Layers keep peeling back getting closer and closer to seeing what is really inside these characters, including the enemy.
This book was gripping, emotional, and eye opening.. and I loved it! And I want more! Can't wait for book two!
This story begins as a tale of what happens to the heroes after they win the battle. They are celebrating (some are not so celebratory) the 10 year mark of the defeat of the Dark One. I loved this so much because, especially coming from Sloane's perspective, I feel like this is a very truthful look at this situation. Some moving forward and a few, like Sloane and Albie, are still having a very hard time. This book gives such an honest look at PTSD, it's just, WOW! Spot on.
However, this 10 year anniversary turns into a whole new shade of drama and Sloane (with a few other Chosen Ones) is right back in the middle of a fight... this time, it's against the Resurrectionist. Nothing is really as it seems, even Sloane. Layers keep peeling back getting closer and closer to seeing what is really inside these characters, including the enemy.
This book was gripping, emotional, and eye opening.. and I loved it! And I want more! Can't wait for book two!
“Chosen Ones” is one of those fantasy novels that sets up the world and rules for the majority of the book. The last 100 pages included the most plot and character development. But if the worlds interesting (which it is) then I like the world building. Plus their are a lot of interesting moments before the last 100 pages. The characters feel like real people and I actually really enjoyed the main character even though she is a piece of work. I don’t want to read about perfect people. Who wants to read about perfect people??? I don’t understand why so many people judge a book harshly because the characters have flaws. Like??? Flaws are the most interesting part. My 2 cents. Anyway, it’s weird and new and takes a new spin on the chosen one trope.
P.S. and possible spoilers:
Mox is a scary cinnamon role and I love him.
P.S. and possible spoilers:
Mox is a scary cinnamon role and I love him.
I just loved following this story that starts with the heroes after the big victory. There are many dark places to go so make sure you check on trigger warnings, but the aftermath of any kind of trauma is so well written into this story.
And then things start to happen and secrets unfold and well, what do you do when it looks like you have to do it all over again.
And then things start to happen and secrets unfold and well, what do you do when it looks like you have to do it all over again.
If you're able to get through the first half, its worth it.
So here’s the thing...
This book is definitely a mixed bag. Firstly, I want to say that writing a book is tough in general and trying something new deserves a pat-on-the-back no matter the outcome...so I give Roth kudos for that. The concept of focusing on trauma, PTSD, etc and on its effects on everyday life is a much needed topic of discussion. I don’t feel like it’s always actually portrayed or understood in media, etc., and I looked forward to experiencing that contrasted with fantasy elements in this story. I appreciate Roth for bringing that topic to the forefront.
In terms of characterization, I looked forward to the bonding that would naturally occur between The Chosen Ones after experiencing so much together and how it would be portrayed in this story, but I found myself moving back and forth too much between moments that felt natural for the characters and moments that felt out of place. Mainly, I think this was because there was so much built up emotion and turmoil within the characters that stemmed from hugely traumatic experiences that we as readers never got to experiences ourselves. We were dropped in 10 years later and never got the time to “catch up” and be on the same emotional plane as the characters we are supposed to relate to. I feel like I would have been more on board with the overwhelming detail of these characters lives if I knew them already from, let’s say, a previous book or at least more flashbacks. Although I felt the detailed moments between all the characters were not inherently bad - in fact, the banter and details were refreshing at times and made you stop to let things sink in instead of rushing to the next page - I felt this tool of “details” was misused or at least underutilized, partly due to its over abundance. There was a lot of dialogue piled on a lot of descriptions piled on a lot of 3rd-person narrative trying to somehow still be 1st person while thoroughly embracing the long-winded descriptors of 3rd person. Except... that it was not thrown at us in monotonous, breathable chunks but in almost every paragraph. In other words, I liked a lot of her descriptions but would have appreciated the cleverness of them more if there wasn’t so much “noise” - too many words, too many points, too many details, too many directions, too many distractions keeping me from focusing on the main point of a moment or paragraph. It’s said that it’s best not to put decor on every wall in a room but to leave blank spaces. Yes, I believe that applies in writing too. Ask a question with a moment and let us dwell on it before you move on to a new detail that we have to try to process in the next sentence before we finish processing what came before. The 3rd person just felt clunky.
Overall, the books had lots of interesting moments but the disjointedness tainted the experience for me. I found myself frustrated with the extremely slow pacing, trying to just get through all the noise and make it to the other side still understanding what was going on. Things simply felt “out of place”. What I mean is, the biggest strength of this book was the focus on the everyday struggle, the bonds built with time and shared experiences, and Sloan’s (the main character’s) moments of uncertainty which make her more relatable and imperfect; but the weakest part was its incompleteness. I felt like I was supposed to feel comfortable dropped into the characters’ aftermaths without having the proper context to get me there. Like I said earlier, I personally felt that I would have appreciated this story more if this was a sequel to “The Dark One” or whatever is would be called. You know, the core story - the original story - of how the kids develop over the years while fighting the bad guy for the first time and experiencing how they got their trauma in the first place. As a reader, I want to feel the shock of the Deep Dive WITH Sloan as she’s experiencing it or the immense dread wash over me as Sloan sees The Dark One look at her through the rubble of a Drain. I want to see both the unraveling and the rebuilding of these characters, see them develop, face the reality of the Dark One, “grow up” too fast because of the horrors they’ve seen, experience them fighting to stay hopeful but losing their innocence slowly. I want to cry with the pain of that, with Albie happily making an origami crane and then not being able to look at one. We are told the characters have nightmares or cope in some way like an addiction, but we don’t really get to experience the pain of the character - with the exception of Sloan to a degree. We often learn why they do what they do with a quick mention of an event or a snippet of an article/document reference to an event, but that’s more about giving me information rather than allowing me to feel it. I did rather like the concept of the mini flashbacks, but with so much mystery in regards to the Chosen Ones’ past, I felt the flashbacks weren’t powerful enough to compensate and so there was a lack of character development.
Essentially, what I felt was most lacking was a balance of growth and conflict. I didn’t feel much of it until the last third of the book which made it hard to get though. I know the intention was to focus on the aftermath and to focus on the characters as adults, but I feel like some more context was required for me to feel more attached to the story. I didn’t feel there was enough “action” until the end of the book (i.e. conflict). We are told about conflict, but I didn’t really get to feel much of it until the end when the plot’s mystery points started to be revealed. On a positive note, I have to say that I appreciated how Roth’s plot came together at the end but was saddened that it took so long to see growth and conflict which are essentially dependent on each other.
What I mean is, it’s fine for things to click at the end but not if you are unsure how to build anticipation through forward moving plot devices. Yes, there were clues that led to later events in the book, but it didn’t feel like quite enough. Overall, there was a bit of this and a sprinkle of that and a splash of this but not enough of any particular thing: incompleteness. We do see progress of the conflict of Sloan’s PTSD by the end which is nice, but it felt like her self-growth was more dependent on another person (aka Mox) and “trauma bonding” with him rather than on eventually letting go of her guilt through self-forgiveness and self-love. I get that that’s a realistic thing that happens, but it doesn’t mean that she’s made healthy progress beyond the illusion of it. She’s replacing her guilt with co-dependency (not trying to label), maybe? Yes, love and support from others is good and feeling accepted for all that you are is essential for building self-love but honestly I didn’t feel any rhetoric or thoughts from Sloan indicating that she had accepted herself beyond her feelings of acceptance around Mox. To note, her breakup with Matt needed to happen for her to grow so that was a “good” moment in this novel in terms of conflict/growth, but she essentially went from Matt to Mox. On another positive note, although Sloan seems to change a lot because of Mox, she is still struggling at the end of the novel. Trauma isn’t just fixed. I do like how Sloan still seems to have things to work though at the end; that’s relatable and realistic. But... I feel she didn’t get the growth she deserved by the end.
With that said, I would have rated the book higher if Roth had utilized all the potential of her own creation but, alas, I felt like I read a story that knew what it wanted to be but didn’t know how to communicate. In a way, I suppose the book successfully achieved personifying a confused Sloan that doesn’t know how to feel about itself.
This book is definitely a mixed bag. Firstly, I want to say that writing a book is tough in general and trying something new deserves a pat-on-the-back no matter the outcome...so I give Roth kudos for that. The concept of focusing on trauma, PTSD, etc and on its effects on everyday life is a much needed topic of discussion. I don’t feel like it’s always actually portrayed or understood in media, etc., and I looked forward to experiencing that contrasted with fantasy elements in this story. I appreciate Roth for bringing that topic to the forefront.
In terms of characterization, I looked forward to the bonding that would naturally occur between The Chosen Ones after experiencing so much together and how it would be portrayed in this story, but I found myself moving back and forth too much between moments that felt natural for the characters and moments that felt out of place. Mainly, I think this was because there was so much built up emotion and turmoil within the characters that stemmed from hugely traumatic experiences that we as readers never got to experiences ourselves. We were dropped in 10 years later and never got the time to “catch up” and be on the same emotional plane as the characters we are supposed to relate to. I feel like I would have been more on board with the overwhelming detail of these characters lives if I knew them already from, let’s say, a previous book or at least more flashbacks. Although I felt the detailed moments between all the characters were not inherently bad - in fact, the banter and details were refreshing at times and made you stop to let things sink in instead of rushing to the next page - I felt this tool of “details” was misused or at least underutilized, partly due to its over abundance. There was a lot of dialogue piled on a lot of descriptions piled on a lot of 3rd-person narrative trying to somehow still be 1st person while thoroughly embracing the long-winded descriptors of 3rd person. Except... that it was not thrown at us in monotonous, breathable chunks but in almost every paragraph. In other words, I liked a lot of her descriptions but would have appreciated the cleverness of them more if there wasn’t so much “noise” - too many words, too many points, too many details, too many directions, too many distractions keeping me from focusing on the main point of a moment or paragraph. It’s said that it’s best not to put decor on every wall in a room but to leave blank spaces. Yes, I believe that applies in writing too. Ask a question with a moment and let us dwell on it before you move on to a new detail that we have to try to process in the next sentence before we finish processing what came before. The 3rd person just felt clunky.
Overall, the books had lots of interesting moments but the disjointedness tainted the experience for me. I found myself frustrated with the extremely slow pacing, trying to just get through all the noise and make it to the other side still understanding what was going on. Things simply felt “out of place”. What I mean is, the biggest strength of this book was the focus on the everyday struggle, the bonds built with time and shared experiences, and Sloan’s (the main character’s) moments of uncertainty which make her more relatable and imperfect; but the weakest part was its incompleteness. I felt like I was supposed to feel comfortable dropped into the characters’ aftermaths without having the proper context to get me there. Like I said earlier, I personally felt that I would have appreciated this story more if this was a sequel to “The Dark One” or whatever is would be called. You know, the core story - the original story - of how the kids develop over the years while fighting the bad guy for the first time and experiencing how they got their trauma in the first place. As a reader, I want to feel the shock of the Deep Dive WITH Sloan as she’s experiencing it or the immense dread wash over me as Sloan sees The Dark One look at her through the rubble of a Drain. I want to see both the unraveling and the rebuilding of these characters, see them develop, face the reality of the Dark One, “grow up” too fast because of the horrors they’ve seen, experience them fighting to stay hopeful but losing their innocence slowly. I want to cry with the pain of that, with Albie happily making an origami crane and then not being able to look at one. We are told the characters have nightmares or cope in some way like an addiction, but we don’t really get to experience the pain of the character - with the exception of Sloan to a degree. We often learn why they do what they do with a quick mention of an event or a snippet of an article/document reference to an event, but that’s more about giving me information rather than allowing me to feel it. I did rather like the concept of the mini flashbacks, but with so much mystery in regards to the Chosen Ones’ past, I felt the flashbacks weren’t powerful enough to compensate and so there was a lack of character development.
Essentially, what I felt was most lacking was a balance of growth and conflict. I didn’t feel much of it until the last third of the book which made it hard to get though. I know the intention was to focus on the aftermath and to focus on the characters as adults, but I feel like some more context was required for me to feel more attached to the story. I didn’t feel there was enough “action” until the end of the book (i.e. conflict). We are told about conflict, but I didn’t really get to feel much of it until the end when the plot’s mystery points started to be revealed. On a positive note, I have to say that I appreciated how Roth’s plot came together at the end but was saddened that it took so long to see growth and conflict which are essentially dependent on each other.
What I mean is, it’s fine for things to click at the end but not if you are unsure how to build anticipation through forward moving plot devices. Yes, there were clues that led to later events in the book, but it didn’t feel like quite enough. Overall, there was a bit of this and a sprinkle of that and a splash of this but not enough of any particular thing: incompleteness. We do see progress of the conflict of Sloan’s PTSD by the end which is nice, but it felt like her self-growth was more dependent on another person (aka Mox) and “trauma bonding” with him rather than on eventually letting go of her guilt through self-forgiveness and self-love. I get that that’s a realistic thing that happens, but it doesn’t mean that she’s made healthy progress beyond the illusion of it. She’s replacing her guilt with co-dependency (not trying to label), maybe? Yes, love and support from others is good and feeling accepted for all that you are is essential for building self-love but honestly I didn’t feel any rhetoric or thoughts from Sloan indicating that she had accepted herself beyond her feelings of acceptance around Mox. To note, her breakup with Matt needed to happen for her to grow so that was a “good” moment in this novel in terms of conflict/growth, but she essentially went from Matt to Mox. On another positive note, although Sloan seems to change a lot because of Mox, she is still struggling at the end of the novel. Trauma isn’t just fixed. I do like how Sloan still seems to have things to work though at the end; that’s relatable and realistic. But... I feel she didn’t get the growth she deserved by the end.
With that said, I would have rated the book higher if Roth had utilized all the potential of her own creation but, alas, I felt like I read a story that knew what it wanted to be but didn’t know how to communicate. In a way, I suppose the book successfully achieved personifying a confused Sloan that doesn’t know how to feel about itself.
I really enjoyed the world that Veronica roth created for this book. The first half was very slow for me but there were many unexpected plot twists which I really appreciated
DNF, the first part was interesting but the second part when they flip dimensions refused to keep my attention.
adventurous
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I liked this pretty well, a little disappointed that certain characters were introduced and then left out of most of the book.