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A review by yazaleea
Legend by Marie Lu
4.0
My rating : ★★★★☆
(Almost exactly) 10 years ago, 13 year old me discovered Legend, the book that made me into the avid fantasy/YA reader I am today. I did read books before this one (a ton) but it really stayed with me: Guess I have always been a hoe for enemies-to-lovers-let's-destroy-the-government-and-now-kiss and it started here!
I did reread the series each time a new book was released but after that, the trilogy remained in my brain as *the* YA books that really left its mark on my childhood and my career as a reader. As I grew and the way I consume fiction changed, I was terrified of the thought that maybe my childhood faves were, in fact, terrible.
When I received [b:Rebel|42121526|Rebel (Legend, #4)|Marie Lu|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1557505626l/42121526._SY75_.jpg|65927270], the last entry of the series, on my birthday (thanks Steph <3), it was the perfect opportunity to uphold the tradition and reread the whole series before discovering the final book. The thing that happened with Marie Lu and NFTs kinda put me off but I decided to leave it aside and go for it.
I finally opened Legend two days ago, after convincing myself that I'd probably not enjoy it that much, that the gap between years of nostalgia and the reality would end up in a disappointing, underwhelming experience.
I am so, so glad that it was not the case at all: I had a blast. Yes, it's cliché YA, yes it's not perfect but I! Don't! Care! I had fun and that's why I'm reading books for.
//A little warning that my review is biased by the fact that I've read the next books, I remember how the characters will develop and the key twists the story will take. This is more of a "me revisiting them" that discovering any of these. Spoilers ahead!//
The Characters
June was the character I was so sure I'd hate. I thought I was going to find her annoying, in the way many leading ladies in YA are written as overly girlbossing, overly hardass with no substance. But to my surprise, I actually loved her alot? A "noble" genius that has to carry the weight of being the only genius her country has ever known, scoring her perfect score on the Trial that determines one's future in the dystopian nation they live in. Her development felt natural and logical to me, unlike many of her fellow YA leads that seem pushed into events and changes, enduring them rather than engineering them.
Day is another YA stereotype; charming, clever and cunning, a pretty face that hides a dark past; blah blah blah. He checks all the boxes for a male lead but that doesn't make him less endearing to me. He cares for his family and is ready to do pretty much anything to keep them safe. He acted as a not very subtle but still efficient foil to June's character:
Other side characters, like Tess, Day's accomplice and little sister-like partner, June's older brother Metias (I know he didn't appear often but I love him so much), the hot fighter Kaede were a really nice addition to the main cast and I liked reading about them.
The Plot
See, there's nothing too special about the plot: Girl in the system goes through an event that changes her life, she seeks revenge, she is confronted to the truth, her country is *gasp* evil and what/who she thought was bad turns out to be her only shot at challenging the giant that used to have her in its grasp. It's YA through and through, but I liked it. I liked how everything was put together, I liked to see the characters evolve and make things happen.
The romance between June and Day borders on insta-love, it's true but I like how it was framed as a hormonal teenage attraction that builds into something more as they're thrown into danger and revelations. Again, this almost superficial "love" is challenged in the other books so I definitely recommend reading the sequel if you want to see it happen. It didn't shock me or turn me off to see two teenagers finding e/o attractive and kissing.
Their relationship goes beyond romance though: it's messy and twisted and it starts off as a revenge scheme for June and then she meets that guy that sounds *nothing* like what she heard but she does something that will break him. But they're two people stuck in a web, two kids that don't know any better and I like how they move through issues, how they go forward. I just think that they're neat. The first book might at first portray their relationship like instant attraction - which is boring - but it develops into more than simply this, they change and events make them mature and it impacts the way they see each other: who to trust, how to trust? And I think it was done very well!
The Worldbuilding
The worldbuilding is probably the weakest element of this first volume. Many opposing factions are introduced, without being fully developed and the inner mechanisms of how the Republic works are mostly hinted at - it is a military, dictatorial-ish state that spells out "hello!! I'm a dystopian evil nation!!!". But I know that this will be well explored in the later volumes - Legend only gives a first taste, we are given some tools to understand the situation, not too much to the point it's confusing but maybe a little under what I would have expected for a first book.
Anyway, I am in love with this series; it will always have a special place in my heart's bookshelf and I am so happy that it's just as good as I remembered it to be. I love the characters and I love the world and I can't wait to continue my reread of the trilogy + discovering Rebel <3
(Almost exactly) 10 years ago, 13 year old me discovered Legend, the book that made me into the avid fantasy/YA reader I am today. I did read books before this one (a ton) but it really stayed with me: Guess I have always been a hoe for enemies-to-lovers-let's-destroy-the-government-and-now-kiss and it started here!
I did reread the series each time a new book was released but after that, the trilogy remained in my brain as *the* YA books that really left its mark on my childhood and my career as a reader. As I grew and the way I consume fiction changed, I was terrified of the thought that maybe my childhood faves were, in fact, terrible.
When I received [b:Rebel|42121526|Rebel (Legend, #4)|Marie Lu|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1557505626l/42121526._SY75_.jpg|65927270], the last entry of the series, on my birthday (thanks Steph <3), it was the perfect opportunity to uphold the tradition and reread the whole series before discovering the final book. The thing that happened with Marie Lu and NFTs kinda put me off but I decided to leave it aside and go for it.
I finally opened Legend two days ago, after convincing myself that I'd probably not enjoy it that much, that the gap between years of nostalgia and the reality would end up in a disappointing, underwhelming experience.
I am so, so glad that it was not the case at all: I had a blast. Yes, it's cliché YA, yes it's not perfect but I! Don't! Care! I had fun and that's why I'm reading books for.
//A little warning that my review is biased by the fact that I've read the next books, I remember how the characters will develop and the key twists the story will take. This is more of a "me revisiting them" that discovering any of these. Spoilers ahead!//
The Characters
June was the character I was so sure I'd hate. I thought I was going to find her annoying, in the way many leading ladies in YA are written as overly girlbossing, overly hardass with no substance. But to my surprise, I actually loved her alot? A "noble" genius that has to carry the weight of being the only genius her country has ever known, scoring her perfect score on the Trial that determines one's future in the dystopian nation they live in.
Spoiler
I liked to see her going from the Republic's prodigy that blindly trusts the institution that benefits her to discovering the truth about her family's tragic fate.Day is another YA stereotype; charming, clever and cunning, a pretty face that hides a dark past; blah blah blah. He checks all the boxes for a male lead but that doesn't make him less endearing to me. He cares for his family and is ready to do pretty much anything to keep them safe. He acted as a not very subtle but still efficient foil to June's character:
Spoiler
one is the Republic's Darling while the other has been abandoned and left for dead by the same institution.Other side characters, like Tess, Day's accomplice and little sister-like partner, June's older brother Metias (I know he didn't appear often but I love him so much), the hot fighter Kaede were a really nice addition to the main cast and I liked reading about them.
The Plot
See, there's nothing too special about the plot: Girl in the system goes through an event that changes her life, she seeks revenge, she is confronted to the truth, her country is *gasp* evil and what/who she thought was bad turns out to be her only shot at challenging the giant that used to have her in its grasp. It's YA through and through, but I liked it. I liked how everything was put together, I liked to see the characters evolve and make things happen.
The romance between June and Day borders on insta-love, it's true but I like how it was framed as a hormonal teenage attraction that builds into something more as they're thrown into danger and revelations. Again, this almost superficial "love" is challenged in the other books so I definitely recommend reading the sequel if you want to see it happen. It didn't shock me or turn me off to see two teenagers finding e/o attractive and kissing.
Their relationship goes beyond romance though: it's messy and twisted and it starts off as a revenge scheme for June and then she meets that guy that sounds *nothing* like what she heard but she does something that will break him. But they're two people stuck in a web, two kids that don't know any better and I like how they move through issues, how they go forward. I just think that they're neat. The first book might at first portray their relationship like instant attraction - which is boring - but it develops into more than simply this, they change and events make them mature and it impacts the way they see each other: who to trust, how to trust? And I think it was done very well!
The Worldbuilding
The worldbuilding is probably the weakest element of this first volume. Many opposing factions are introduced, without being fully developed and the inner mechanisms of how the Republic works are mostly hinted at - it is a military, dictatorial-ish state that spells out "hello!! I'm a dystopian evil nation!!!". But I know that this will be well explored in the later volumes - Legend only gives a first taste, we are given some tools to understand the situation, not too much to the point it's confusing but maybe a little under what I would have expected for a first book.
Anyway, I am in love with this series; it will always have a special place in my heart's bookshelf and I am so happy that it's just as good as I remembered it to be. I love the characters and I love the world and I can't wait to continue my reread of the trilogy + discovering Rebel <3