If The Young Elites
was good, then The Rose Society
transcended any and all of my expectations. It's darker, sexier, and just fuller than the first one. Adelina has
truly come into her own.
Adelina is supposedly the villain in her own story, but she
never feels that way to me. Never once do I feel any sort of resentment or
hatred towards her. She may be hell-bent on her revenge, but Marie Lu writes in
such a way that Adelina is completely justified for her thoughts and actions. I
root for Adelina. I hate her enemies with her. I feel myself descending into
her madness alongside her. She is always in the right.
My few complaints from the previous book have been
completely nullified. While I originally had a problem with flip-flopping
perspectives (Adelina's lengthy chapters told in first person and random,
shorter chapters in third), I find this book much more consistent in its
presentation. I even looked forward to the random breaks in Adelina's monologue,
where the side characters take over. Maeve, Teren, and Raffaele are all
complex, sophisticated characters, each with an ulterior agenda.
Marie Lu does an excellent job balancing the new characters
with the old. She doesn't bog us down with too many of them. It's wonderful to
meet this new cast and to get a more in depth experience of all of their
individual powers.
I must say that I now get the *big deal* surrounding Teren.
I found him rather tedious in The Young
Elites, but now he seems to be one of the most complicated characters in
the story. I'm beyond eager to see what will come into play for him in the next
book.
On the other hand, in The
Young Elites, Enzo was one of my favorite characters, and now I find his
presence a tad... offensive. I suppose coming back from the Underworld would
change anyone, but it's easy to resent him when one takes into account the
hypocrisy with which he treats Adelina. It's like my perspectives have flipped.
It's complicated.
It's all
complicated. And that's one of the most amazing things about it. All the
characters are so real; the world
itself is well planned. This story is built upon layer upon layer upon layer,
each layer being gradually revealed to us as deeper and more tangled than the
last.
I am both dreading and eagerly anticipating the ending. Who
am I kidding? I'm basically drooling over it, desperate for it. But the dread
is still intact. The biggest reason for this is that I know from my previous
experience with the Legend series that Marie Lu will not write easy or tidy
endings. There will be finality and closure, yes, but it will most likely rip
some hearts to shreds in the process. It will probably rip up my own. Oh, I
love sad endings, but they are still tremendously difficult to read.
I really can't praise this series enough. It's not just that
this is an impeccable book; it's also that Marie Lu is an impeccable writer. I
fully intend to read anything and everything she publishes.
