Insurgent: Girl Guilt Syndrome
Hi! I’m Ani, a fiction editor specializing in and loving all things romance, fantasy, and lit fic. I’m a cheerleader for indie authors, a writer and poet myself, and a prolific chai drinker. Reach out, and let’s talk editing!
TL;DR at the end, as always.
Recently, I’ve been completing a developmental editing course from Club Ed (which btw is AMAZING, thank you, Jennifer Lawler!), and one of the assignments involved picking a book with poor reviews to try our hand at developmental editing. I, of course, immediately veered off course and decided that I wanted to, instead, dev edit a book I just didn’t like to see if my dislike was based on dev issues or not. Thus, I arrived in a local used bookstore (shout out to Helen’s Bookmark) on the hunt for either ACOTAR or Divergent. I came across Fifty Shades of Grey first, and believe me, I genuinely considered it for a hot second. That sounded like so much fun to me. But overall, I thought I wanted more of a challenge (since FSoG is a verifiable hot mess). I couldn’t find Divergent, and the Sarah J. Maas books available would have sent money directly back to her (because it was one of the few new books the store ordered), but to my surprise, Insurgent was lazing about on the shelf directly opposite. Snatched it up, I did indeed. I walked out of the bookstore with smug assurance that it was about to be over for the book. I was going to take it down!
This was a mistake.
“Sheepish” personified. Photo by Elimende Inagella on Unsplash
I spent the next five hours sticky-noting and highlighting the living dickens out of this poor book, looking for character motivations, goals/plot points, conflicts, and characterizations. It was an extremely interesting read from an editorial lens. I made several discoveries in the course of this investigation.
First of all, traditional editors are no joke. Someone had already had a stab at this, because no book ever comes to a publisher in perfect condition (unless Veronica Roth is just a superstar, which I guess is possible). (Veronica if you’re reading this, you were a huge part of my teenagerhood, and I think your writing is excellent, even though I wasn’t a fan of this book in particular. Take all this as a compliment, particularly since I was on a mission to poke holes, and only like, made a small dent in the fabric. Needle too big? Anyways.)
Second, character conflicts, goals, motivations, etc. were extremely clean! The lines of influence and confluence and conflict were a well-established web, and I enjoyed discovering this.
Eventually, though: However! There were three issues in particular that explained to me why I became less and less a fan of this book the older I got.
PAUSE
Insurgent spoilers ahead (obv). Proceed no further if you don’t want to be spoiled!
Hamster. That is all. Photo by Ricky Kharawala on Unsplash
(elevator music picture while we wait politely for people to exit)
Okay.
Here we go:
First, there are a few plot points that are left hanging over the course of this book. Primarily, Four’s mother: She is essential to the plot, but less essential as a motivator for Four. When we first meet her, she creates conflict between Four and Tris: Was he going to reintroduce his mother into his life? And if so, was that going to affect his relationship with Tris? Around his mother, Four became more secretive in Tris’s eyes, and she may not have tolerated that long term if he stayed around his mother. Instead, his mother practically disappears for the next 150–200 pages until she reappears to support the climax of the book. If Four’s mother really impacts his emotional landscape, we should have continuing conversation about her between Four and Tris or at least hints of her being in his mind.
Further, Caleb betraying Tris. This is never truly resolved or justified. Why did Caleb have to do this? Caleb ends up feeling like a plot device because he disappears and then appears in the story whenever the plot needs him. I would argue that he is absolutely unnecessary to the plot subsection where Tris is captured and studied. Additionally: Why is Tobias there after Tris turns herself in? He was supposed to access the computers to destroy Erudite from the inside, but this is made irrelevant by Tris’s execution being moved up, which is never addressed. If Peter is the reason Tris is saved (without any significant action on Tris or Tobias’s part—see agency section further down), then both Tobias and Caleb are unnecessary to this subsection of the plot. For this plot subsection, one potential solution could look like cutting out Tobias and Caleb, and then having Tris slowly convince Peter to save her (to also avoid Peter’s flimsy tit-for-tat motivation).
Second, Tris’s emotional resonance, which is a crucial element of the story (the most significant way that readers connect to the story), is lacking because her motivation doesn’t change; it only grows. By this, I mean that her motivation never complexifies. Tris’s main motivator is her guilt: Her guilt over Will’s death at her hands, her guilt over her mother and father’s death, which she feels is her fault, her guilt about Maureen’s suicide, her guilt about the many choices she’s had to or been forced to make over the course of the war. This leads her to betray Four in the end, though it was in search of necessary information. This is excellent character development, absolutely, because we get a full picture of how this affects Tris, but it unfortunately leaves her motivation lacking. Tris’s guilt needs to complexify in order for her to have a developed character arc with movement from one element to the next. Compounding is not the same thing as complexifying. An example of a potential complexification would be guilt over her love for Tobias not being as essential for her as Tobias’s love for her (a new facet of guilt!!). Or, alternatively, her guilt could transform into resentment, which would have led to a totally new set of actions. Her guilt pigeonholes her into a set of behaviors that become entirely predictable, instead, and lead to the inevitable conclusion of her suicide in the next book (sorry, more spoilers). This predictability reduces the tension in the book and allows for readers to disconnect emotionally.
Third, agency. There are scenes in this book that result from Tris being acted upon rather than her acting to create her own environments. These scenes then make themselves unnecessary in the scheme of the book. For example, the scene where Tris gives herself over to Erudite. Because Tris hands herself over, the following scenes happen to her, and as a result, a passivity develops that may lose the reader. This arc (Tris handing herself over and then slowly being brought to her lowest low because of what she endures) is meant to reveal to us an essential character trait: Tris does not want to die, despite what she may have thought before. And this is an excellent realization! However, this should be realized actively. This ties into the character arc suggestion as well: If Tris’s character is complexified, she may be able to act in a way that isn’t predictable (such as handing herself over to Erudite) and instead act upon resentment (for example) to hand herself over with the intention of ruining everything from the inside, even if it kills her. This allows her both to make active decisions and also to be forced into a situation where she realizes she doesn’t want to die. Transforming this into a story where Tris attempts to commit suicide over and over builds passivity that, over time, will make readers either put down the book or become resentful of the story they’ve been strung along with. Put differently, losing her will to live makes the audience lose their will to live, since this book is written in 1st present POV. Additionally, this doesn’t fit the genre, as dystopian romance is not usually centered on a character who is actively having suicidal ideation. Instead, dystopian main characters (especially FMCs) will frequently be kickass fighters, go-getters, or just spiteful and angry characters who will make active decisions to further their own plot based on their motivations and goals. Active choices will make for an engaged audience.
TL;DR
Four’s mom needs more development
Tris needs to be more than just guilty
Tris needs to be active, not passive
Thanks for hanging out!
More fun things to come.
