I am absolutely delighted to have found a series that
enraptures me so thoroughly. Usually, I find myself loving the first book in a
series and either feeling indifference or disdain for the latter books, but Prodigy has thoroughly proven that this
will not be the case for the Legend series.
I will admit that the story did start off a little slow for
me. It shouldn't have, considering it picks right back up where Legend ends, but I guess there's always
that awkward phase before a book truly blooms into itself. It doesn't take long
to do that, to turn into something wonderful that is LIKE Legend but is also just like itself.
In the beginning, June and Day have traveled a long way in
search of the Patriots. Day's leg was brutally wounded in Legend and they are now desperately seeking out medical help, even
though they have no means of paying. Turns out, the Patriots' preferred method
of payment is for both June and Day to aide in the assassination of the new
Elector, The Republic's supreme leader.
June's job is to win him over, to use his obvious attraction
to her as a strength and to lead him right into the Patriots' trap. Day's job
is to act as a social icon, to grow in fame and seek out the public's support
for the Patriots' cause. Throughout all this, both characters are exposed to a
great deal of danger and are lead to ask questions concerning right and wrong,
innocence and guilt, truth and lies.
That's one of the things I love about this book: the shadowy
gray area that neither corroborates nor condemns any one character or movement.
You think you know whom to trust, you think you know what is going to be right, but you can never truly follow
your instincts in this one. I made my own assumptions, but I didn't prove or
disprove them until the very end. And perhaps I still haven't, seeing how the
story continues in Champion.
The main characters themselves also live in the gray area,
even as they gain so much depth throughout Prodigy.
I loved both June and Day in Legend,
but here they feel like such real, rounded out people with equal parts hope and
fear, equal parts benevolence and resentment. Perhaps the reason they achieve
that depth is because of the decisions they are forced to make throughout the
story. They continue to show their true colors under pressure, such as June's
refusal to go against her convictions and Day's refusal to go against June.
Can I just say that this is a great love story? The problem
with love stories is that they are usually so overdone or so over the top, but
this isn't the case here at all. Perhaps I'm too in love with this world to
speak about it rationally, but I found myself rooting for the two of them,
cheering them on, and then dying inside when they couldn't be together, and
further on hating Tess for her part in taking Day away from June.
Literally, my only problem with the June and Day dynamic is
that they feel so much older than fifteen. But then, I guess that's why he's a
legend and she's a prodigy...
All the other characters are well rounded too. I disliked
Tess, but that's only because of her attempts to seduce Day. I did not,
however, dislike Anden, despite his obvious attraction to June. He is rather
admirable (at least at this point) for his ambitions to turn his country around
even though it is the opposite of what his politicians want.
That's another thing I like about this novel: how political
it is. At least it seems political for YA. The fact that the present politics
are so well thought out and mentioned consistently leads me to the conclusion
that this is a good dystopia.
Seriously, I oftentimes dislike when dystopias try to explain away how the
world came to be in it sorry state. If it's going to be a poor explanation, I'd
prefer there be no explanation at all and to let me just enjoy the world as it
is. There were moments early on in Prodigy
where I was dreading the upcoming explanations, particularly when they talked
about the technological advancements of Antarctica.
But it turns out this world was very well planned-politics,
history, and culture all included. Marie Lu definitely doesn't launch into
heavy explanations, but she presents her world with such consistency that you
really wouldn't dare to question it.
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