Jocelyn McClurg

USA TODAY

Yes, there is life after Divergent.

Veronica Roth has moved on from Tris, Four, "factions" and post-apocalyptic Chicago for a whole new galaxy.

And her fans have launched another best seller as Carve the Mark, Roth's dark new teen sci-fi adventure, lands at No. 9 on USA TODAY's Best-Selling Books list. (The full list will be published on Thursday.)

Carve the Mark (Katherine Tegen Books), book one in a two-book series, is Roth's first book since she wrapped up the blockbuster Divergent series and its spinoffs.

Carve is set in a galaxy where everyone has a predetermined fate and a special power — powers that can be used for good or evil ends. The main characters are a young man named Akos, who is kidnapped by a cruel dictator, Ryzek, and Ryzek’s younger sister Cyra, whose “currentgift” allows her to inflict pain on enemies, but also causes her to suffer terrible pain of her own.

In a recent Facebook Live chat with USA TODAY, Roth was asked by a fan if she was nervous about leaving Divergent and starting something new.

“Oh yeah, definitely,” she said. “Divergent was comfy for me. It was always a challenge, but it was a world I knew really well. The hard part was leaving the characters. They had been voices in my mind for years. They were like friends, constant companions.”

Divergent made Roth, now 28, a formidable force in the young-adult literary world. Two of the books in the trilogy (Divergent and Allegiant) hit No. 1 on USA TODAY’s list; Insurgent made it to No. 2.

Watch Veronica Roth's live chat on 'Carve the Mark'

It was a long, slow climb for the first book. Published in 2011, Divergent entered the top 150 at No. 83 in March 2012 and hit No. 1 in January 2014 in advance of the movie adaptation that starred Shailene Woodley and Theo James.

In a *** (out of four star) review of Carve the Mark, USA TODAY’s Brian Truitt wrote that the novel “excels when settling into the core relationship between its two embattled leads.”

Roth has been on a 10-city book tour.