So you’ve watched the movie, and then found the books and then read the whole series and felt quite pleased but you finished the book and now you’re clueless about what to read.
How about giving books like Divergent a try? There are billions of books in the world and new books are released every month so it’s relatively easy to find something that is like or in some cases better than the Movie Divergent, and in this article I’ll make your search moderately easier.
So let’s get started but before that, do know that Authors love their series and trilogies so most of the books here will be either in series or trilogies.
1. The Lunar Chronicles
Author: Marissa Meyer.
“So I’m going to Luna and I am going to start a revolution”.
What do you think would be the outcome if you put Cinderella, Snow White, Rapunzel, and Little Red Riding hood in a sci-fi action-adventure novel? No ideas? The outcome will be The Lunar Chronicles. This story is set in the futuristic era where Humans, Moon colonists, Androids, and Cyborgs live together (literally in a few cases).
The Lunar Chronicles has 5 books and every book of this series has a different protagonist but our main focus here will be the first book “Cinder” and it’s protagonist Linh Cinder. Linh is a cyborg who runs a mechanic shop at the local street market in New Beijing and lives with her adopted Mother and 2 step-sisters (sounds familiar?).
Despite being looked down upon, Cinder becomes the best mechanic and being the best mechanic lands her a job from the prince of the Empire himself. Later on, Cinders’ sister catches a fatal disease (Letumosis) after going with Cinder to haul spare parts. That enrages her adopted Mother and she volunteers Cinder for the plague research, and that’s where she begins discovering the truth about her existence and the danger that the world and prince Kai are in.
I think Cinder resembles Tris in too many ways, with exception Tris had impressive parents, I’d like to talk about the rest of the books but that’ll need a separate article.
2. Legend
Author: Marie Lu.
I don’t always love Authors’ but when I do, I love Ms. Enid Blyton and Ms. Marie Lu (I haven’t forgiven Ms.Rowling for killing my favorites). Legend is a YA dystopian fantasy novel that Ms. Marie Lu was inspired to write this novel after watching the movie “Les Miserables” and managed to give us a thrilling book.
The book nicely portrays the conflict, deception, Struggle, conflict, and the different spheres of society. It revolves around 2 teens June Iparis and Daniel Wing, who are from completely different worlds. While June is a prodigy from Republic’s highest circles, Daniel is a wanted criminal.
To save his younger brother, Daniel steals medicine from a hospital and stumbles across June’s brother who is later killed and his murder is blamed on Daniel, so June sets out catch Daniel and finds out that he’s not as bad as she thought he was and starts developing feeling for him. That last part reminded me too much of Four and Tris when four nearly hunted her and hence this is one of the books like the Divergent.
3. Shatter Me
Author: Tahereh Mafi
“All I ever wanted was to reach out and touch another human being not just with my hands but with my heart.”
Oh hey! Have you ever read a book on Rogue (from X-men) that is almost like Divergent! If not then you try Shatter me.
Shatter Me almost shattered my heart, and once you’re done reading, it might shatter yours too.
Shatter me is set in a world where people can fight over food, birds don’t fly anymore, and the sky has taken up a permanent shade of grey; it’s scary but it might become our reality soon… anyways, the story is about a 17-year-old girl named Juliette who has a deadly touch (literally), and whoever has been touched by her dies and this has lead her to be isolated and which in turn made her partially insane (heartbreaking).
But… this book is annoying, there were too many instances where the author did things that were completely unnecessary and ruined the good story. For eg: Overly long description on the eyes and the gaze of the guy, and then and then and then (that was too much of then), and last but not the least– the crossed-out sentences. Maybe that’s supposed to portray her insanity…
Apart from that, the book is genuinely good and resembles Tris while she was being hunted, and if you liked Divergent… there’s a chance you might appreciate this one too.
4. Birthmarked
Author: Caragh O’Brien
If you ever read a review of this book don’t double-take upon reading “Fulfilled their quote delivering 3 babies per month” that simply means that the character and her mother acted as a midwife. Birthmarked is yet another dystopian novel that is set in a dying world, and like Divergent it depicts the society inside the walls but unlike Divergent, only the select people live inside the walls while lower-class lives outside.
The story revolves around Gaia Stone (weird name if you know the meaning) who along with her mother works as a midwife and has to deliver 3 babies per month to the Enclave. But one day after Gaia returns home from delivering her first-ever baby (that sounded misleading) she finds both of her parents arrested.
That makes Gaia question her perfect society and must find a way to decipher the secret code left by her parents to find the truth. If you’re looking for good dystopian novels or books like Divergent… then you need to give this one a try.
5. The Chemical Garden trilogy
Author: Lauren DeStefano.
This book is a scientific nightmare…probably one of the most forbidden things if it was possible to be done. Wondering what I’m talking about? Well, you see in this book the protagonist as well as the people around her know exactly when they’ll die… it all happened when scientists tried to create a perfect human race that backfired and made everyone a ticking time bomb.
Out protagonist Rhine Ellery, a 16-year-old is kidnapped (like many other girls) and sold to a rich guy named Linden who has a dying wife… but Rhine wants to be free and has just 4 years to live. So the Rhine decides to run away with the help of Lindens’ servant (Gabriel) and starts falling in love with him… they manage to escape but little do they know that terrible things await them.
This book makes an impact, but it’s written rather poorly. Imagine writing an essay in an exam and having only 3 mins left, that’s how this book has been written.
6. Courier’s Daughter
Author: C. J Redwine.
My personal favorite book in this article and highly recommended if you secretly like badass women… when I saw the cover, it reminded me of Princess Merida from Brave and when I read it, it was Princess Merida but with a small twist.
The novel is set in the post-apocalyptic world where women and men alike live inside the walled city named Baalboden and in this city, women have no power. The Majority of women are taught to stitch, dance, and bend to their master’s (protectors) wills.
But our protagonist Rachel isn’t one of them, she does hunting, tracking, and sparring instead of stitching and dancing. One day her father (the courier) disappears and is deemed dead, and in his will, he states that Logan (Rachel’s ex) who was her father’s apprentice became her protector. But both Logan and Rachel don’t believe that he’s dead, so they set out to find him. Will they be able to find him or is he truly dead?
As I mentioned before, Rachel makes me think of Princess Merida, but Rachel tends to get sappy so it was a tiny bit off-putting and Logan… he needs a few punches.
7. Partials
Author: Dan Wells.
This is a better alternative for Courier’s daughter and one of the books like Divergent that you need to try at least once. Oh well, what do I say… I simply loved the protagonist in this book, oftentimes the majority of the female leads were just at the right place, and at the right time but not here, the female lead in this book is seriously skilled and actively looks for a cure.
Our protagonist Kira lives in a world where humanity is endangered and the cause of this is their war with the engineered beings (cyborgs) named Partials and also a virus that has left only a small number of people immune. In this world, 16-year-old Kira Walker and her team actively look for a cure that’ll save humanity from extinction.
Kira decides that the cure might be found by looking into the partials so they manage to kidnap a bunch of them and run some sophisticated genuine sounding tests on them. Considering she’s just a student, they aren’t always a success. Do you think she’ll manage to find the answers to her questions and save humanity?
The book is set apart from others as the romance doesn’t start till the second half of the book and tastefully builds up the suspense and the thrill; you might find it hard to put this book down at times.
8. The Testing
Author: Joelle Charbonneau
Do you find the admission process of your favorite university, hard? Well, you’ll change your opinion after reading the testing series. The story follows the journey of Cia Vale, a high school student who has been chosen for the testing process. The testing involved a series of exams, passing them all will offer the chance at a college education. The future leaders will be chosen from the same group, to rebuild what the war destroyed.
The testing process is a four-round process, core subject knowledge, experiments, group problem-solving exercise, and survival challenge, sound simple isn’t it? But it involves manipulation, death, secrets, and self-survival. With a piece of advice from her dad, not to trust anyone. She goes for the process where everything is a test. This novel is a mixture of divergent and hunger games. The only con is that it’s too much like them.
9. Red Rising
Author: Pierce Brown.
This novel is a masterpiece in the sci-fi genre. It portrays a strict caste system (similar to divergent) but follows colors instead of houses, gold at the highest, and red at the bottom. This series follows a sixteen-year-old Darrow, who is red.
He and his fellow reds, manipulated in believing that they were making Mars as a livable surface soon they get a reality check. Darrow who saw his Lover get murdered and his whole family enslaved. In an attempt to make a better place for his children and follow his wife’s dream of freeing his people.
He enters in a cutthroat competition, longing for justice. It deals with complex problems that exist in different societies. It’s more brutal and bloody as it involves themes like rape, torture, execution, sex exploitation, and betrayal. But you’ll definitely find it entertaining and hard to keep it down.
10. Hunger Games
Author: Suzanne Collins.
About time! I’ve been itching to write about this one. Even if you haven’t read the book, you must’ve at least watched the movie. If not even that, then I think you’re living under a rock. Anyways this intense novel is about a cruel game, hunger games where only one can survive from the 12 districts, and the participants will be chosen from each district, one boy and one girl.
If you’ve watched the movie, then you already know that after the death of her father, Katniss was a hunter and sole bread earner in her family and led quite a miserable life herself… But her life takes a turn for worse during the volunteering, where her little sister is selected and where Katniss panics and asks to be selected instead of her sister and funnily enough the guy who is selected along with her is Peeta Mellark, who once saved her life when she was nearly dying of hunger.
If you think that you know everything as you’ve watched the movie, you’re dead wrong. The movie didn’t precisely show how hard Katniss’s life was before volunteering and how hard it became later on. It didn’t show how angry she was after blowing up the supplies and finding just dry fruits with the guy who died…or having how heartbroken she was when District 11s’ Rue died… The Hunger Games is one of the books that you can’t simply keep down until you finish it and a must-read if you’re looking for books like Divergent.
Conclusion:
First of all, Thankyou for reading and secondly, sorry for all the spoilers you found here. Initially, I wanted this topic to cover around 20 books but alas my enthusiasm was my downfall and hence all I could give were 10 books with a long description.
Obviously, there are many other books like Divergent but I haven’t read them all, so if there’s any other book like Divergent that you have read and wish to recommend, then do drop a comment below, we might even add it to this list.