Divergent Archives - Brooke's Reviews and Sweeps

Fangirling On Friday — On Sunday!

By Brookelorren on January 13, 2019January 13, 20194 Comments

Yesterday on Twitter I saw that Books in The Sky was starting a new weekly prompt: Fangirling on Friday. It sounded like a lot of fun, and I typically don’t post anything on Fridays, so I figured I’d try it out. I think her first prompt was from last Friday, so I decided to jump in — on a Sunday!

This week’s prompt was Fandoms, so I decided to start with my favorite fandoms: Book Fandoms I have Written Fanction For. Writing fanfiction takes a lot of effort, so there has to be a reason for it. Even reading fanfiction takes time from all of the other amazing books out there. So these are kind of in order from my earliest fandom favorites to last month.

The first two novels I ever wrote were band fanfics (that’s why I’m narrowing this topic to book fandoms). It took me a year to write both books. Then I stopped writing for a long time, as I went to college and got busy in other things.

But then I read Divergent. Probably the first book series I really fangirled over. I got to about page 50 in this book, and then… I read the rest of this book, Insurgent, and Allegiant in two days. I remember going to bed crying and heartbroken at 4 AM.

But at the same time, I thought “this is fiction. I’m not going to take this ending.” So the next day, I discovered fanfiction. I didn’t start writing it right away… and I really have to admit, I’m not very impressed by my first effort now. But my recent Divergent fusion fanfic with the next fandom turned out okay…

If we magically teleport forward to 2016, we’ll find the Legend fandom, which I’ve written the most fanfiction for to-date. My husband had to go to the hospital one evening (fairly routine for us because of his sickle cell anemia) and I had just reread Legend, and I thought, “what did happen to Day and June after Champion?” This was before Life after Legend or the Legend 4 announcement. I didn’t want to leave it at that, so I wrote my first Legend fanfic and… didn’t finish it. I only wrote 14 chapters.

Never fear, I got a note last February from someone who wanted to read the end of my story. I was missing writing by then, so I finished it. And I started writing more stories, in multiple fandoms. Which led to me starting my first original novel for last NaNoWriMo.

I write fanfiction because I want to tell a story about the existing characters that I already love. I fell in love with Adelina and Magiano. They’re so sweet together! After I read the ending to The Midnight Star, I didn’t want to leave it at that, but I saw a glimmer of hope at the end. So I started writing Saving Adelinetta. It’s on haitus at the moment, but so far it’s at over 68,000 words, and I have about 1/3 of the book left to write.

I also have a cute little modern-day AU that I set aside for NaNoWriMo where Adelina and Magiano meet over World of Warcraft. I was originally planning on a longer work, but I think this will make a cute short story. I can always write a sequel later. As a short story, I might be able to get this out in a month-ish. My non-fanfic work is taking priority though.

I just love Akos and Cyra from Carve the Mark! They’re perfect for each other. I was a little wary of The Fates Divide, especially with the tagline “He’d Die for Her, She’d Kill for Him” but I was pleasantly surprised about that end. So… I never felt the need to write a long novel or novella about these two, but I did write a very short story (only 618 words) about what happens to these two about five years after the end of the story. I don’t know if I’ll ever feel like I have to write more about their story, but you never know. I get ideas from the strangest of places.

The last story I’ve actually written was a strange combination of fandoms that I’ve never written about before: Clary and Jace from the Mortal Instruments run into Brenna and Patrick from Brenna Morgan and the Iron Key while they are being chased by a demon. Clary, thinking that she’s going to get them to someplace safe and planning on getting backup, accidentally teleports them to the universe of the story that I’m writing. And then they have to find their way home.

I’m not really comfortable writing much Shadowhunter’s fanfiction yet. There is so much to that universe, and I try to be very detail oriented with my fanfiction, so I haven’t written anything else yet. Although I do like to read Shadowhunter’s fanfiction.

The final fandom that I love enough to write fanfiction about is Warcross… kind of. I loved this duology, and I have nothing more to say about this particular story at the moment… however…

Marie Lu said that Asher Wing is related to Daniel Wing from Legend. That got me thinking: “how did the Wing family go from Asher being this mega superstar to Daniel’s family being dirt poor?” And “Why is June named June when she was born in July?” So, although I haven’t written a word to this story yet, I’ve been kicking around this story, about Asher’s grandchildren/Day and June’s grandparents (different sets of grandparents… I’m not going to make them inbreeding cousins or anything) that answers these questions. It’s going to be mostly original characters with cameo appearances from some people from Warcross.

So that’s it! Fandoms I fangirl over so much I write/read fanfiction of them! On Friday (no, I don’t plan on making the Sunday edition a thing) I plan on writing about Dragons!

Veronica Roth Strikes Again with Carve the Mark

By Brookelorren on January 18, 2017Leave a Comment

Yesterday I was a really happy camper because I had worked late on Monday and Veronica Roth’s new book, Carve the Mark, had already arrived in my mailbox before I woke up. Thank you mailman! Of course, I was then up late yesterday finishing the book.

Many people that know me know that I absolutely adore Divergent. The first time I read the book, it took me a few days to read the first 50 pages or so, but once I got to that point, I read the rest of that book AND the next two books in two days. Then I read the entire series in Spanish. I also have the first book in German and Russian. At one point, I think I was the second best player in the world, of all time, in Divergent trilogy Quiz Up (I was the best player in the world in that game in a couple of different months… I’m currently the 3rd best player in the world of all time).

When I heard a year or two ago that Veronica Roth had been signed to write a sci-fi book about some characters in space, I was a little skeptical. Is this going to be a Star Trek type book, and is it going to be any good? I was going to have to read it anyway.

I love this book. I will definitely be reading the rest of the books in this series when they come out (I believe that this is also supposed to be part of a trilogy). Although the setting of this book is different, it still has a great plot, characters that you love (and some that you hate), and relationships that you are interested in. Oh, and there’s a plot twist at the end of the book that leave you with theories… and leave you with wanting more.

The book is set in a universe that is quite unlike ours. As a result, the first chapter introduced a lot of new vocabulary that took a while to get used to (there is a glossary in the back though). If you feel that way about halfway through the first chapter, don’t put the book down! After the first chapter, the fact that we were in a completely different universe with all different plants and ways of doing things didn’t seem so distracting, and I’m sure that as I read through the book a second time, it will all seem normal and I will see more things in the book.

I don’t want to give out any spoilers, but I will give out some basics. In one part of the planet, we have Akos. He’s from a well-off family that cares for each other in a fairly peaceful society. On the other part of the planet, there’s Cyra, part of the royal family in a more warlike society. Due to circumstances beyond their control, Akos and Cyra are forced to be a part of each other’s lives. They find a way to work together when they find out that they have similar goals, even though on paper, they probably shouldn’t trust each other. While that one-paragraph synopsis might not sound that exciting, the book is.

If you love Divergent, then you’re probably going to love Carve the Mark. Even though the setting is different, people (or human-like people, at least) in Veronica Roth’s worlds are people no matter where you go. Some are inherently ambitious and evil, others have that spark of good, and others are a little more complicated than that. If you find out that you love both Divergent and Carve the Mark, you might also be interested in Marie Lu’s Legend and Young Elites series. I may review those at a later date, but those are similar books (Legend is a distopian YA novel set in future Los Angeles, the Young Elites is a YA novel set in a different universe). I may review those at a later date.

Get A FREE Copy of the Divergent Epilogue!

By Brookelorren on January 7, 2017January 7, 2017Leave a Comment

I’m a HUGE Divergent fan. Veronica Roth could buy… something… with the money that I’ve spent on her products. I own the entire series in English, the main trilogy in English and Spanish, and the first book in German and Russian as well. I also have all of the movies that she’s released so far. Being the huge Veronica Roth fan that I am, I have, of course, already pre-ordered her new book, Carve the Mark (of course I will be reviewing it here).

Did you know that Veronica Roth has created an epilogue to the Divergent Series? AND you can get it for free? There’s one catch though: you have to either buy Carve the Mark or pre-order it someplace.

I won an Amazon.com gift card in the last couple of days of last year, and I knew exactly what I would be spending it on: the new Veronica Roth book. So I already have met the requirements to get this free book. Yay!

So if you want to get the free We Can Be Mended book like me, you’ll first have to pre-order the book. You can get it by clicking on this lovely Carve The Mark link that leads you to Amazon.com (and if you do, I thank you for supporting this blog), or the Amazon.com picture to the right..

Once you pre-order the book, you’ll want to follow the following link get the FREE We Can Be Mended Divergent epilogue. You’ll need to submit a digital picture of your receipt, along with your address and basic contact info. That’s it!

The free We Can Be Mended epilogue giveaway is sponsored by Epic Reads, which is a promotional service of Harper Collins Publishers.