Divergent question

Perhaps a venture away from the YA category will yield you a better crop of dystopian tales. There are so many books out there that describe dystopian worlds with plotlines that do not follow the same path as the stories already stated:
Brave New World was my introduction to dystopian fiction.
Animal Farm / 1984 and 1984 by Orwell are far cries from Divergent and Hunger Games.
The Handmaid's Tale
Battle Royale
Lord of the Flies
Robopocalypse

I loved Hunger Games, but I usually try to stay away dystopian fiction. I think the dystopian genre is one of the more difficult genres to write it. You have to create a world that's totally evil and wrong, in order to make a political statement about how our society could become that if we're not careful. Then you have to make it believable enough to keep the audience engaged. It takes an extremely talented author to do both. Books that are written solely to try to ride the wake of another book's success (like the wannabe Harry Potters and the wave of vampire romance novels) are usually written by the worst authors. So when all the "me too" authors start trying to write in a genre that's difficult by definition, what you get is some less than stellar literature. Which brings us to Divergent.

Divergent strong points were it's characters. She did a pretty good job of writing about a weird, crazy, and somehow still relatable teenager's coming of age story, as she awkwardly makes friends and struggles through a troubled romance. Where she fails has all to do with the setting. The world is fundamentally broken. The science in that world is stupidly inconsistent. In fact, it's not really science at all, it's actually just magic, because it only works when it needs to in order to move the plot along. It's a science fiction book as written by someone who obviously doesn't read much science fiction, or even like it at all. And the society they live in is impossibly impractical. It's hard to imagine what could possibly convince humans to run things that way.

Basically she fails with the science, and she fails with the society. Those are the two main aspects of a dystopian novel, so she really should've picked another genre.

I hear you. Some of these dystopian stories are getting pretty tired. I just read the "Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" series as a change from dysptoian YA fiction, and it was great. The politics can often turn me off of dystopian, but the survival elements are what keep me coming back. I love the sense of adventure when the characters are stranded out in the middle of nowhere trying to survive. That's why I like the Hunger Games so much and don't like Catching Fire or Mockingjay nearly as much. There's nothing wrong with the dystopian genre on its own, but mediocre writers writing mediocre books are making it hard to choke down.

Yes it's wearing itself out just like the YA paranormal. It started out being different but now it's just becoming repetitive. I read Hunger Games and called it done. Those were good but I'm not interested in reading more.

I genuinely am so sick and tired of everyone saying the dystopian is so great now! They constantly suggest these books to me and every time I decide to give it a shot, they're all just boring and repeats itself. Girl falls in love with wrong guy, rebellion starts and girl joins rebellion, girl saves everything or it falls to shit. I mean, really. Think of something more original. Even paranormal had more variety than this.

There are some really good ones, but lately the ones that I find best are more post-apocalyptic than dystopian.

One of my favorite non-YA dystopia though, is Shades of Gray. OH MY GOD, THAT BOOK WAS FANTASTIC. By far the best dystopia I've ever read.

Yup. Dystopian's a pretty good genre, or should I say was, but now too many people are giving in to the hype and there have been too many mediocre dystopian books.

i agree that dystopian books are running out of stories. but every genre has its rise and fall. i read only YA dystopian and very rarely do i see a book with a different storyline. it gives an appearance that the genre is fully exhausted but i feel no one put it to full use. hunger games, divergent, under the never sky and pledge were great. the rest were rip offs. most authors write with one track mind. they neglect to look through layers and view multi dimensionally. even the fantasy genre under YA is repetitive. for authors, the success element is to follow in someone's foot prints. if they can break out of this cycle, any genre can revamp itself.

It's not only YA but I quite agree. I read Hunger Games triology, one or two Maze Runner and some other dys novels for all ages and had to stop partway through. Here in Canada we've had a master dystopian writer, Margaret Atwood, whose Handmaid's Tale has twice been dramatized to great popularity and great relevance to the present US political scene, unfortunately. Still, in the fiction field it's just getting to be over the top and feels a little like disaster porn in some ways. I know we live in uncertain times, my boomer generation has failed spectacularly to address climate change and youth have more reason than ever for adolescent angst...as do the rest of us. But thumping on that one key can start to wear on the nerves.

Totally agree; just as Twilight was the era/age/etc. of the "teen paranormal romance novel", this is the age of dystopias and superhero movies and all sorts of other things which define our culture and media now. I'm tired of it just like the next person, I have no idea as to why this genre is so popular nowadays.

But, when we say that, it's because we've forgotten what made these genres so popular. They were huge when they first came out because they were what we are calling for now: original. Hunger Games was only so popular because no one had thought of such a complicated and intriguing plot until the novel was written. Since then, people have wanted to have as much fame and recognition as HG and have written books with similar premises. It's not necessarily the worst thing to happen to books and humanity or anything like that. This, just like all the other books and genres which have taken cultures by surprise and storm, is how a cultural fad begins. Then people become uninterested and move on and create more books and the fad dies and everyone else is into something else and the cycle begins again.

Now, here's an idea when you run into the problem of "I'm so sick of X genre because I'm sick of it/all books in it are the same/I can't find any book I like anymore/my friends don't read anything else/etc.": if you like reading and writing so much (which I guess you do because you all read books and write quite a bit, an awesome thing in our world nowadays), how about you write an innovative, concise, multi-dimensional, engaging, and overall best-selling novel that's so original that it would become the next sensation? My motto is: you write the book you want to read.

I agree completely. Just like "paranormal romance" (something that shouldn't even be a genre if you ask me), dystopian books are just a faze that has caught on among YA authors. Some are very good, like the original that started them all, The Giver. Others are just horrible though. When anything's overdone, it gets sickening. That's just what's happening with this genre.

The Giver is Utopian, not Dystopian.

That being said, there are plenty of great science fiction books and series that are neither Utopian nor Dystopian... I don't know why I'm capitalizing those words.

I'll recommend Ender's Game, Dune, Starship Troopers, Ringworld, Cryptonomicon, The Time Traveler's Wife, and The Stars My Destination.

All of those save for the last one have been made into movies which fall well short of the books grandeur.

I love dystopian books, but I do understand your POV.,there is time in which the stories are getting tired. But as I like this kind of book, and after read THG and DIVERGENT, I decided to read one or two dystopian books per year, no more.
For this year the Masterpiece is 1984 by Sr.George Orwell

Yes, thank you for bringing this up! At first, I was enthralled: The Giver, The Hunger Games, etc. Then all I could find while browsing GoodReads was dystopian. I understand the genres come in waves, and I believe it's high time for the dystopian genre to fall into its own little dystopia. Bring back the steampunk!

I totally understand where you are coming from. I've recently finished all of these series and cant express how completely worn down this plot line is. I, personally, am more interested in the hardcore moments, the war. And in a lot of these young adult dystopian societies, yes there is war, but the main focus is on the personal struggles of the main character, whether it be the love triangle r mental struggle. What i would really like t see emerge from this genre is a more powerful stance on the actual events during the war, for example in the Hunger Games: Mockingjay movie there were two scenes I loved in particular, the dam scene and the forest scene. These were the only moments where i felt the story truly expressed the aggression and power of the oppressed people and the need for the end of a corrupt government system. I really wish that scenes like these did not take a backseat to the drama of the stories because I feel that they really express the causes and effects of war, along with the true spirit of freedom and justice.

The dystopian genre is ancient. If you are feeling burnt out with the modern YA dystopian books, look into more classic examples.

I read Unwind and it's really good for YA dystopia.

I don't know about dystopia anymore, I've read way too much and it always elves me kind of in a somber mood.

I still have so many more dystopian books to read, but none of them give me the thrill the way fantasy does

personally i dont agree, theres a reason why theyre so popular with teens these days. yes i agree that some series or dystopian books may not have much plot or may be based on similiar series but a lot of dystopian series are amazing and ingenius. Divergent is by far the most the best dystopian series written as it different to a lot of ya novels.It may not be as popular as the Hunger Games (which are also an amazing series) but should deserve more praise than it.
It portrays a fractured society broken by humans desire for perfection and also mistakes.Some may argue its not realistic or futuristic but in reality it is. Just like the Hunger Games,The Mortal Instruments,Maze Runner or even Harry Potter they all have an underlying message.The protagonist and characters face feelings of pain,loss,betrayal,love,death and new revelations and above it all they have a fight for survival and must protect those they love and face new truths,.They arent perfect they'll have their flaws and downfalls but they'll get through.At the same time not all may survive and this is realistic as not all heroes live or all people may survive.
In our current day and age these ideas may not be far from the future due to the breakdown of our society. We may not be fighting in an arena,casting spells,escaping society,dealing with angels and demons or dodging a disease but these dystopian novels are far from tiring.

I think, like the Twilight era, it depends on what it is, some of it is just same old copycat bull, but some of it can be pretty good, its a hit or miss genre, it's either fantastic or like rereading something else, or even just really bad.
Like The Fearless was a brave new mix on things, but the character development and storyline was seriously lacking., Wheras The Giver was similar storylines but a different outtake and came of really well.
I guess it just has to be the right one, a lot of the dystopian society ones can be very similar, so sometimes just reading post-apocolyptic dystopian instead can spice things up, but I definitely know what you mean, I struggle even now to read vampire/supernatural creature romances because the genre was so overdone.

Perhaps the problem you have is YA Dystopian? Don't get me wrong, I love Hunger Games as much as the next person. But one has to wander into more than just teenage fiction. (Note I'm not saying YA is a bad genre.)
Brand New World, 1984, Fahrenheit 451, Animal Farm etc. These are dystopians which do not follow the formula you are so bored of.
Myself I am starting Brave New World after I finish with the Night Circus (been meaning to read that one for like ever lol) I'm kind of excited to see what all the hype is over. =)
So I guess I'm not done with Dystopian just yet.

I'd like a dystopian with a twist, like where the government wins for once. Not an ideal ending, but it'd shake things up.

I definitely agree with you. There are too many dystopian novels. The problem with all of these novels is that they all have the exact same basic foundation: in the future....government/life/order has been changed....government=bad/evil.....rebellion.

I think it would be very interesting to see a dystopian novel that WASN'T about rebelling and overthrowing the government or whatever. Someone needs to change it up!

If there's already a book out there like that, please let me know:)

i've always liked dystopian more than any genre and for me it's still my favoriate, nothing like a good dystopian. most of my favoriate books are dystopian like, under the never sky, shatter me,Delirium ,slated ahhhhh!
I think the biggest issue with the genre is that its so popular so many people write in it, so it'll have more not very good books. i just think its a case of looking for different books that arent so hyped up!
But i find that with this genre you do need breaks from it, so i seem to be drifting towards contemporary's which point out how crap my love life is! :L

I wouldn't say that I am tired of it- I enjoy reading them still, and I'm not ashamed to be in love with The Hunger Games, Divergent, and The Maze Runner. I believe that you should always try new genres {for example, I currently am obsessed with Fairytale Retellings}, but that doesn't mean you can't still love the other genres.

I just started getting into dystopian novels, However I do understand how one can get tired if the same formulaic story retold over and over again.

I began reading poetry, memoirs, and clean teen fiction. Erica Kiefer's teen fiction are really good. Try Rumors and Lingering Echoes.

I've read HUNGER GAMES, DIVERGENT, MAZE RUNNER and UNDER THE NEVER SKY. Gonna read THE GIVER. I can say that I'm not yet tired of reading dystopian novels. I wanna read more so I could compare each of the dystopian worlds that's been created by these amazing authors.

I'm also looking for the dystopian world wherein I can see myself living in to. And so far, I think I can see myself living in a society that's divided into 5 FACTIONS that was created by VERONICA ROTH.

I got fascinated by the 5 FACTION SYSTEM in DIVERGENT.

Im not done yet, I just started. Many years ago in grade school we read The Giver and Ive read it several times since. (Excited to see the movie Friday.) I've only recently discovered "dystopian" books like Divergent and The Hunger games. Of those, Ive only read the first 2 books of Divergent. The only taste of Hunger Games Ive gotten is the movie.

I have participated in a writing challenge called NaNoWriMo 8 times, "winning" (reaching the goal of 50k words in 30 days) only twice. Im not sure if I will ever be able to share my work with the world, but it has certainly given me a great appreciation for all the work every author puts into his/her work. Its easier to read that 300 page novel then to write it, that's for sure!

What I propose for those dis-satified with what has been written is to develop character, setting, plot, etc yourself and see what comes of it. Possibly even participate in the NaNo challenge in November. (If you do sign up, my handle is Emily Logan.) I challenge/dare you to put "your money where your mouth is". After all, the best way to solve that onslaught of bad books is to write it yourself, right?

I'm tired of EVERY dystopian being about a girl/boy, who doesn't fit into society and starts a rebellion. uuuuuugh

Classic ate great btw but also maybe try fantasy. Sure some of its not great but there are lots of hidden gems.

Divergent came out before the hunger games,in 2011(i think).It's still older and is not wannabe dystopian