Summer Reading: Sidebar-- Kudos to Veronica Roth

I AM THE BIGGEST LIAR EVER. 

Okay, so I'm only a little bit of a liar... and by that, I really just suck at following plans that I lay out for myself. Like: I'M GOING TO WRITE ABOUT LOOKING FOR ALASKA... because I'm not ready to yet. 

Photo from bookriot.com

But, I am going to talk about a series that I read for the second time. The first time I read the Divergent trilogy, I had already gone and seen the movie Divergent in theaters. I also blazed through the three books in about 48 hours. 
So, craving the romantic indulgence that the first book is, I decided to reread. 

I'm not going to spoil the end of the series, because I think it truly is worth reading. So much so, that I am going to URGE you to PLEASE read them. 

I am however going to say that Veronica Roth is an author that truly inspires the writer in me. I have such respect for writers who are able to make you feel the same hollow pain of loss for their characters after multiple readings. I felt just as sad as I did the first time I read through them, I felt just as happy and frustrated when Tris and Four fought (that's no big spoiler..) and I hated the same evil characters.

To begin with, as a reader, I get overly attached. Like in TFIOS-- it's a book about kids with cancer. You open the cover and you know someone is going to die. You don't know who, it remains a mystery til the author gives it away, but you know.. something is going to happen. Yet, I get attached to the character. I feel like they're my friend. Someone I root for to win, to feel something, to be happy. It's a pretty terrible character trait for myself. I end up crying over the pages of my book (or lately the screen on my kindle). 

Not that she'll ever read this blog (though, how AWESOME would that be???), but:

Thank you Veronica Roth. Thank you for inspiring me to write with such conviction so as to push the emotions of my readers, to create such convincing and real characters that a reader would cry, laugh, or love with them. Thank you for making me cry through each of your books and reminding me how human characters are supposed to be. Thank you for writing these books so that someone like me could read them and learn from them. 

One Very Grateful English Major