We've had tons of dystopian novels coming out this past decade or so, reflecting on everything from our use of technology to the way we're destroying the planet. But Veronica Roth tried to look even further, presenting us a post-dystopian world that looks at what might come after.

Poster Girl is set after the collapse of an oppressive dystopian regime, where we meet Sonya Kantor, former poster girl for the Delegation. She grew up in a world of constant surveillance, where people had an implant called Insight put in their eye that rewarded or punished every action. But now, after the revolution, everyone is moving on with their lives, while Sonya has been imprisoned for ten years. When an old enemy comes with a deal, offering her to find a missing girl who was kidnapped by the old regime, it's her opportunity to get back her freedom, once and for all.

The influences Roth took from our world to build her dystopia were clear. None of it felt too far-fetched either, as she mainly relied on mechanics that we already integrate in our lives. That Insight tracker people got implanted might sound ludicrous to us, but we all did allow smartphones into our lives, didn't we? With enough time passed, I can see us beginning to think like Sonya does:

"The system seems clumsy to her now – why carry something in your hand when you could carry it in your head, instead? If you spend all your time holding something, caring for it, feeling its warmth – it may as well be part of your body, as integrated as an eye."

I also like the idea of how the Delegation, that strict former regime, gamified life to push their agenda. Do something good and you earn DesCoin, break the rules and you lose them. I saw the connection between trackers and smartwatches and all those devices that constantly keep us hooked. There were casual passages that felt like comments on our society, too – in painfully many countries period products are taxed as luxury items and not recognised as basic necessities and that's something that is no different here.

With all of that said, this felt like it only scratched the surface and that post-dystopia setting didn't work out as well as I hoped it would. We don't actually feel the threats of the Delegation, we don't witness the suffering and brainwashing. It's a lot tell and not show in that regard, which felt like a missed opportunity, because those were the bits that felt the most interesting. And even those weren't particularly new or boundary-pushing for people familiar with that genre.

I'm surprised this is marketed as an Adult novel, because it felt like it belongs in the YA section of the bookshop. Everything felt pretty watered down, the main story never quite picked up in either pace nor tension and the main character never really grew on me. While the idea of having a protagonist who is suddenly facing a world where everything she grew up to believe in is suddenly condemned as immoral and wrong had a lot of potential, I felt like the plot didn't make enough of it.

What would you do for freedom? This is the question at the centre of this novel and it is one that isn’t taken lightheartedly. When Sonya Kantor, a prisoner of the Aperture, was a young girl she lived by the phrase “What’s right is right,” and now, as an adult she is starting to realise that things might just be a little bit more complicated than that.

From the author of the bestselling ‘Divergent’ series comes the empowering story of a young woman who fights for what she believes in. When an old enemy shows up in her apartment with a slip of paper she must decide whether to stand by what she was taught or give that up and fight for her freedom which is a mere fingers touch away.

We are introduced to a dystopian world where the criminals of the revolution are locked away in the Aperture, a prison on the outskirts of the city. Within the Aperture lives Sonya, the poster girl and face of the Delegation, a government taken over by the revolution many years ago. However, the youngest prisoners of the Aperture are being released except for Sonya who just missed the age cut off. Therefore, she is given the chance to fight for her freedom through finding a missing girl.

Sonya Kantor is definitely a force to be reckoned with, she is fiery, feisty and fierce in all the best ways. She doesn’t do things by half and she knows what she wants. She is one of the most well developed characters I’ve read this year, and you can physically see how much time Veronica Roth put in to developing this tale.

There are twists and tales around every corner and you are kept on your toes throughout. It is a world unlike any other and I really wish this had been a series rather than a stand alone as I would have demolished this series in a heartbeat. I cannot stress how much I fell in love with the mystery and characters within this tale.

I highly recommend this to anyone who loves dystopian tales and is looking for a shorter read that is just as well developed, if not more so, than ones of the same genre. Phenomenal as always.

A startlingly brilliant new book by the author of the Divergent series with a rich history about a society that has implants, behavioral rewards systems and more darkness than Sonya who grew up in an affluent family new abut it. As one society over throws the other she finds herself locked up for the rest of her life with other people deemed a risk to the new society. A bleak future suddenly seems a little brighter when an opportunity for release comes after 10 long years and a reconciliation she did not think she would ever want. It's an interesting furturistic read that had me on the edge of my seat and I could not put down. I would love more from this new world! There are a lot of possibilities here!

Veronica Roth is probably best known for her Divergent series, a dystopian trilogy set in a version of Chicago where people are divided into personality based factions. Poster Girl is a book set in the aftermath of a dystopian regime called The Delegation, a regime whereby people were living sin-free and with courtesy and decorum were the currency, a currency monitored via insights implanted in a person’s eye. Upon the uprising of this moral dictatorship, supporters of the delegation were moved into the Aperture, a prison in form on the outskirts. Sonya was literally the poster girl for the Delegation, at the age of 16 she posed for propaganda posters, years later she is in the Aperture until she is approached with the opportunity to earn her freedom by finding a forbidden 2nd child taken from her family during the Delegation days who needs to be reunited with her family.

What I liked about Poster Girl is it picks up where so many dystopian books end, what happens afterwards, how do people move forwards, how do people justify being part of it … That’s not to say there isn’t still control and oppression in this book, there is no ‘happy ever after’ following a revolution, there isn’t necessarily a clearly defined good and bad guy.
Sonya is a perfect example of this grey area, with her family she promoted the messages of the Delegation and at the start of theIs book she is still conditioned to believe what it stood for. However she has lost everything and everyone and as she spends more time in society, she starts reassessing her past and her beliefs. The character development in this book was what I also liked about Roth’s writing, Sonya develops from someone brainwashed and sheltered to someone whose eyes are opened and moves from selfish to selfless. I also really enjoyed the energy of supporting character Knox and their interactions with Sonya.

This is a mature, thoughtful exploration into revolution and redemption and thank you NetGalley for the early copy in exchange for an honest review.

What’s right is right.

Gratefully received as an ARC from NetGalley. Whilst the pace was slow the characters & world set up were really well developed. I loved the dystopian-esque morally oppressive world which reminded me of Margaret Attawood and the Handmaids tale. The parallels between the Delegation and our real life world aren’t too far removed. I found the concept really thought provoking and can’t wait to see what Veronica Roth does next.

From a long time Divergent fan.

Poster Girl
⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4 out of 5 stars

Delegation has fallen. The dystopian regime was overthrown in a revolution that created a new society. As a result, those most loyal to the Delegation were locked away, together with their families, in prison called Aperture. Years later, Sonya Kantor, the face of the old propaganda posters, is given a chance at freedom in exchange for a favour. She has to find a girl who was taken away from her parents by the old regime as the ‘illegal’ second child. Given permission to leave the Aperture to complete her mission, she steps into a world she hardly recognises to unearth its secrets...

Poster Girl is a perfect dystopian novel. It has a dark and melancholic atmosphere of constant longing for the lost freedom, family or privileges. Delegation might be defeated, but it is still very much alive in the minds of those living in Aperture. Isolated from the rest of society, they live in the past. Sonya crosses into the world that moved on while still trying to make amends for the old crimes. Torn between Delegation rules that still have a strong hold on her mind and the injustice she cannot ignore any longer, she embarks on a journey that proves more dangerous than she predicted.

I need to admit that it is not a fast-paced book. Those used to dystopian adventures loaded with action might be disappointed. Poster Girls is an attempt at a more reflective approach, where Roth considers, for example, the development of technology and the way it can be easily turned into a surveillance mechanism. I enjoyed the lecture.

My review:
https://abookishdaydream.wordpress.com/2022/10/13/arc-review-poster-girl/

I am huge fan of Divergent and hold it very dear to my heart. So, when I heard that Veronica Roth had a new dystopian novel in the works, I was really excited to get my hands on a copy!

This did not disappoint! it has the same eerie feeling as divergent but is a whole new world and concept of its own and I highly recommend if you are looking for a really good dystopian novel!

Thank you Netgalley for kindly sending me this eARC.

Veronica Roth's latest book 'Poster Girl' is full of all the dystopian and future social anxieties you can get stuck into unpicking - think 'Black Mirror' episode 'Nosedive' meets '1984' with a dash of 'Hunger Games' subjugation.

I thoroughly enjoyed the mysterious path this book took. The protagonist Sonya's own journey to truth and acceptance is full of twists and gut wrenching moments, all predetermined (in some ways) by the vile decisions of controlling governments. Following a somewhat 'hero's journey', she becomes determined to fulfil a mission that is set out for her, then snatched away, but yet her determination continues through.

There's no doubt that Roth is talented in the world of science fiction. Sure, there are moments where I hadn't a clue what was going on, but it was still purposeful, with its abundance of social dilemmas, and suspenseful in its fast paced prose.

Whilst I found the world building good and full of elements of intrigue, some of those questions were never answered, and I really wanted them to be. But despite this, I was totally in the mood for a good dystopian/speculative text, and this certainly quenched my thirst!

I really enjoyed this fast paced, dystopian tale! This book was full of political intrigue and interesting world building, Sonya was a well written character who I liked. The story was on the short side, but I still enjoyed every minute!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC.

I had high hopes for this novel - I'm a fan of the 'girl in a dystopian world goes up against the establishment' genre, but while Roth had tweaked the concept enough to keep it interesting, ultimately it didn't quite work for me. The idea of the lead character being someone who was a poster child for a totalitarian regime was good, and I did enjoy seeing Sonya's journey from brainwashed child to jaded adult, but I didn't feel that there was enough investment in her character to merit the ending. I also thought Roth could have spent more time on the idea that the current government was just as bad as the old regime, that element of the plot felt over too quickly. But if you enjoyed the Divergent series and The Hunger Games, you'll probably like this.

Veronica Roth's first book for adults is a smart, thoughtful dystopia about the lies we tell ourselves and how repercussions can catch up with us when we least expect it.

Sonya lives in the Aperture, a prison where the inmates are mostly left to fend for themselves, a prison full of the families and flunkys of the previous regime, a prescriptive society where citizens every action was seen and judged thanks to the Insight tech made mandatory. Cross the street at a crossing, points added, jaywalk, points deducted. Sonya's father was a highflyer in the regime, she was engaged young to the son of another powerful family, and her face adorned a propaganda poster. Now she grows vegetables on the top of her apartment block to trade for goods, the youngest inmate in the Aperture, her family, fiance and boyfriend all dead. So when she is offered the chance to earn her freedom if she agrees to track down a missing girl, she agrees. But doing so means confronting her past, and facing the truth about her family and the role she played as a perfect citizen.

Well plotted, pacy and thought provoking. Highly recommended.

Imagine a life where everything you do, every word you say and every choice you make, is tracked and evaluated by the government to either be declared “right” (i.e. the government approves and rewards you) or “wrong” (you failed to follow the government’s rigid moral code and will get punished). For you and I, this way of life seems strange, awfully controlled and not something to strive for at all. But for Sonya Kantor, this was the way of life. Then came the Revolution, the Delegation was overthrown and everything changed…

10 years later, Sonya Kantor’s uneventful, dull life in the Aperture, a prison where the most valued members of the Delegation was placed after the revolution, is disrupted when the last person she ever wishes to meet again barges back into her life and offers her a way out. All that Sonya needs to do in exchange is finding a missing girl and she’ll be a free woman once more.

However, finding that one missing girl turns out to be more complicated than Sonya ever expected as more and more dark secrets and even darker truths are revealed in this haunting haunting new dystopian novel by the queen of dystopia - Veronica Roth.


Poster Girl is hands down one of the most well-written books I’ve read this year, both when it comes to the story and world-building but also the writing itself. Some books stay with you long after you finished reading it and Poster Girl is that kind of book. Thought-provoking, unsettling and foreboding in the most brilliant of ways.

I cannot recommend this book enough!

*** Thank you so much to Hodder & Stoughton for providing me with an eARC through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review! ***

I’ll start by saying that while I love dystopian fiction, I’ve never read any Veronica Roth until now. I was pretty excited by the premise and eager to dive right in.
We’re following Sonya Kantor, a 27 year old who has been held in “The Aperture” for the past ten years. When she’s given the chance to perform one “simple” task in exchange for her freedom, Sonya has a decision to make.

I was so intrigued by this world and the writing starts you completely blind, with the background and context slowly and cleverly piecing together.

My only issue was that I just didn’t connect with the protagonist, which is a real preference for me when reading. I didn’t dislike Sonya, but I also wasn’t rooting for her and ultimately didn’t really care how her story ended.

I feel that I’d be interested in a prequel that explores the world of the Delegation before the uprising, that part of the story really hooked me in more than what was actually happening in the present.

Overall I would recommend this book if you like dystopian themes, and while I didn’t completely love it, I couldn’t put it down.

Disclaimer: this ebook was provided to me free of charge from the publisher and NetGalley in exhange for my honest review

— 𝐁𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐑𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐞𝐰 —

𝐓𝐢𝐭𝐥𝐞: Poster Girl
𝐒𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬: N/A
𝐀𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫(𝐬): Veronica Roth
𝐆𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: Dystopian Sci-Fi
𝐃𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐏𝐮𝐛𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝: 18th October 2022
𝐑𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: 4.5/5

”Just because you’re not committing a crime now, by going where you go, by seeing who you see, doesn’t mean that another government, another set of people with another set of priorities, won’t come along and call you a criminal one day.”

Veronica Roth pens this thrilling dystopian that follows Sonya Kantor, poster girl of the recently fallen government named the Delegation, now serving a prison sentence for life in the Aperture with other loyal Delegation followers under the new Triumvirate government. Sonya is given a chance of a new life by agreeing to find a missing girl, even if she despises the man offering the mission. However, this mission uncovers dark secrets of the Delegation, ones that involve Sonya’s family and Sonya herself.

There is no denying that Poster Girl is an absolute page-turner. I truly loved this book, there’s nothing more relatable as the feeling of getting groomed by the government.

Sonya is a character of questionable morals, justifying a system that spoiled her and shat on everybody else. Despite that, I couldn’t help but root for her. I think it was the fact that everyone was so sure of their own perception of her. Pretty Poster Girl with the blank stare, only knowing how to be perfectly obedient. But losing her family and almost everyone she’s ever loved has a way of hardening that softness, creating a character that is both naive; kept in the dark from the truth, and yet simultaneously haunted by the dark.

I wasn’t sold on the character of Alexander Price. He seemed to transition to mean, hard, government man, to soft, self described weirdo. I guess I could have loved his character development more, but thankfully the story wasn’t about him anyway. 😂

In fact, the real star of the show was the general story telling. The world building was multi-layered and intelligent. The plot was impossible to predict but headed exactly where I needed it to go. And the story was filled with so much allegory it’s difficult to describe this as a dystopian or the near future.

🧚🏻‍♀️

👁️Poster Girl👁️

By Veronica Roth

Description:

WHAT'S RIGHT IS RIGHT. Sonya Kantor knows this slogan - she lived by it for most of her life. For decades, everyone in the Seattle-Portland megalopolis lived under it, as well as constant surveillance in the form of the Insight, an ocular implant that tracked every word and every action, rewarding or punishing by a rigid moral code set forth by the Delegation.

Then there was a revolution. The Delegation fell. Its most valuable members were locked in the Aperture, a prison on the outskirts of the city. And everyone else, now free from the Insight's monitoring, went on with their lives.

Sonya, former poster girl for the Delegation, has been imprisoned for ten years when an old enemy comes to her with a deal: find a missing girl who was stolen from her parents by the old regime, and earn her freedom. The path Sonya takes to find the child will lead her through an unfamiliar, crooked post-Delegation world where she finds herself digging deeper into the past - and her family's dark secrets - than she ever wanted to.

👁️👁️👁️👁️👁️👁️

I really enjoyed Roth’s last outing Chosen Ones, so I was excited to get hold of an arc of Poster Girl.

Roth does dystopias well. There’s plenty of Orwellian surveillance state here and Pavlovian behavioural training provided by an implanted ocular device.

The story takes place ten years on from the collapse of the regime that Sonya was both literally and figuratively a Poster Girl for. Sonya is all sharp edges and quiet contemplation. She is difficult but still likeable.

I enjoyed the mystery being unravelled and the discoveries Sonya made along the way. It’s all fairly bleak, which to me is what a good dystopian novel should be.

There’s a bit of exploration into societies ever increasing dependence on technology, and what we are willing to give up for a bit of convenience. Roth is pretty even handed, there are pros and cons woven throughout the story and you’re left to make you’re own judgement.

I found Poster Girl a very enjoyable read. Thanks to @netgalley and @hodderbooks for the advanced copy. Poster Girl is out on the 18th of October.

Full disclosure, I wasn’t familiar with Veronica Roth’s work before going into this book. I’d seen the film adaptation of Divergent but I won’t hold that against her.

Poster Girl is another example of the inevitable culmination of the dystopian genre, where do we go from here?

The police state run wild and the eye of Big Brother ever present.

This book is a great quick read, it has all the requisite twists of the genre and I also enjoy the mix of scale of the stakes of the story.

Unfortunately, there are a great number of unexplored threads and whilst the book is littered with allegory it doesn’t ever quite stay still long enough to explore them.

Thanks for the galley!

Another extremely addictive read from Veronica Roth. Whizzed through in a couple of sessions. Set in a near future dystopia. Had an interesting premise of punishing those whose families have flourished in an overthrown authoritarian regime, which raises all kinds of moral questions. The new regime is of course not as good as it looks at first either, with those in power controlling the masses via less obvious insidious surveillance routes, whilst benefitting from the system for their own ends. The main character is given an opportunity to redeem herself via a deal to find a missing girl.

The main character isn’t particularly likeable but she definitely grows on you as her story and character develops. The love interest and character is a bit weak and could have been scrapped altogether in my opinion, with the spare pages being better used to fill in more substance on the various characters and backstories as they felt a bit light.

It could have easily been developed further to set the scene for the prequel\follow on. I was surprised this was not done, as there were enough strands to develop. I hope it still is, as I would definitely read on!

Many thanks for NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton for giving me the opportunity to read this book.

Veronica Roth has done it again! I absolutely devoured this book and wished it had not ended, It is interesting and has the perfect political undertone, exactly what you'd expect from Roth. Fabulous story.

This is a slow unfolding of a dystopian future with unhappy echoes of our own lifestyle. In the future you have an Insight implant which gives you all the information you could possibly require in return for your every move and behaviour being tracked, analysed and either punished or rewarded. When the regime is overturned those in charge, and their families, are imprisoned for life.

When Sonya, the poster girl for the regime, is offered her freedom in return for finding a missing girl the darkness behind both the past and current regimes starts to come to the surface. All the time there are subtle nuances to make the reader think about just how much freedom we are willingly giving up in return for modern day technology. This never overwhelms the story which develops slowly creating tension as Sonya's beliefs are twisted and challenged as she uncovers more and more secrets. An excellent read.

Everything about this book was gripping from start to finish. This dystopian mystery hits perhaps a little closer to home than I would like, bringing up the issues of data collection and complicity. Sonya is a fascinating character - she grew up sheltered as one of the leading government's elite, content to follow their doctrine and force herself to ignore any of the problems that she was seeing. As such, when that corrupt government fell she was condemned for her actions, when one could argue she just did what any scared and manipulated child would do.

This is definitely an uncomfortable read, and made me think of how visible our day to day lives have become. Going so far as to implant technology into our brains to monitor and track our behaviour seems dystopian and extreme, but I imagine if you travelled back to say 100 years ago and told the people living then that those of the future would willingly walk around with devices that allowed their every movement to be tracked, they probably would have said the same thing...

If you love dystopian fiction then this is a must read!