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A review by lizziepurpleserenity
Legendborn by Tracy Deonn
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
sad
fast-paced
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.5
12th Feb 2021:
First time around in Dec 2020 (couple months ago) I listened to this on audiobook. I've just reread the beautiful hardback copy and omg it is so, so awesome!!! It's made me realise how many details can be easily missed on audio (I did not pay any attention whatsoever to all the side characters, for example!! Who are so cool, Greer being my favourite side character), and how much more immersed I get when physically reading a book instead of listening. I am going to leave my first review below for the sake of posterity, but I must say, last time, I said this was "YA urban fantasy almost at its best" - nope, it IS YA fantasy at its best!
The handling of the reluctant 'chosen one' trope in the context of Black history in the US South, by weaving Black history and magic together with colonialism and the legend (and magic) of Arthur was perfect and poignant and painful.
I LOVED her relationship (as in, the telling of it) with both Nick and Sel, despite usually not getting on very well with instalovey YA romance or love triangles but (a) the connection to Nick possibly coming from the Arthur-Lancelot connection, helped with my feelings about them and the love triangle, which normally I hate and (b) Sel is HOT, although ideally I would not ship her with him either for now haha. Also, both Sel and Nick (given he's the more dull 'nice boy') are layered with interesting backstories and twists (not to mention Bree herself of course). So, the romance in this book actually WORKED for me!
There are only two VERY tiny niggles I have that I can think of, but they really are nitpicks. One is thatAlice disappears in the middle of the book, there are 2 or 3 days and nights that she's not even sleeping in their room, and Bree doesn't even think about her or wonder where she is. That bugged me a lot in those couple of chapters.
Secondly, it is difficult, especially at first, to follow (without taking notes) who is who and in what Line and who is Scion, Squire, Page etc, and I really wanted some sort of flow diagram or table in the back of the book to refer to, beyond the existing table of the Knights. However, I accept there isn't one because it would be extremely spoilerific, but I am going to make my own and I do hope there is one in book 2! My little nitpack though is that (and this is me being totally stupid, to be fair)I could've done with a reminder of who the 2nd to last Scion was to be awakened. I kinda knew it was Lancelot for obvious reasons, but every time it was mentioned that there were 2 more Scions to be Awakened before Camlann, I was wracking my brains trying to remember which character was Lancelot's Scion. Finally, towards the end, it's mentioned that it was someone at Northern (so they thought), I assume this was made clear much earlier on but I didn't remember and it was driving me nuts! As I said, probably my own stupidity...
The handling of grief and Bree's experience with it was exquisite and you could really feel that the author was pouring herself and her own experience into this. I cried several times.
Lastly, first person is my least favourite narrative (bar second person) and I generally don't like present tense, but in this book, the two were PERFECT for the story and the immersion (including physically!), so I didn't even notice. Below, I said "It even gave me goosebumps in a couple of parts." - ha, make that constant goosebumps!
23rd Dec 2020:
I love so much about this book!!! YA urban fantasy almost at its best, imo. Yes it includes a few tropes that have been done to death, but in an interesting way. I loved the Black history context of the story, really interesting, it's left a lot of thoughts churning around my brain. It even gave me goosebumps in a couple of parts.I can't stop thinking about the fact that Bree turned out to be Arthur's heir and to take up Excalibur, and the reasons for that... (I feel really stupid for not having guessed it long before it happened!)
Bree's grief is described and handled really well too (I teared up a few times), and Bree herself is an awesome protagonist. She's not perfect, she struggles and is suffering, but she's also sassy and strong, and proactive. The plot is paced perfectly, the story keeps moving along and we gradually learn more and more about this world and there are unexpected reveals along the way. I also love her friendship with Alice.
I rarely get on with romance in YA books, and in some ways this book was no exception butI have to admit, the fact that Nick was almost the only ray of sunshine in Bree's life meant I forgave it and let her have it :D Love triangles are usually an absolute no-no for me, but for some reason the potential of a love triangle with Sel I'm actually finding a little intriguing, perhaps because of his history with Nick, and that Sel himself was a pretty cool, mysterious character in himself, so that was an interesting new experience for me :D
I listened to the audiobook of this but I will be buying the gorgeous book as I want to reread it physically soon to take it all in more fully.
First time around in Dec 2020 (couple months ago) I listened to this on audiobook. I've just reread the beautiful hardback copy and omg it is so, so awesome!!! It's made me realise how many details can be easily missed on audio (I did not pay any attention whatsoever to all the side characters, for example!! Who are so cool, Greer being my favourite side character), and how much more immersed I get when physically reading a book instead of listening. I am going to leave my first review below for the sake of posterity, but I must say, last time, I said this was "YA urban fantasy almost at its best" - nope, it IS YA fantasy at its best!
There are only two VERY tiny niggles I have that I can think of, but they really are nitpicks. One is that
Secondly, it is difficult, especially at first, to follow (without taking notes) who is who and in what Line and who is Scion, Squire, Page etc, and I really wanted some sort of flow diagram or table in the back of the book to refer to, beyond the existing table of the Knights. However, I accept there isn't one because it would be extremely spoilerific, but I am going to make my own and I do hope there is one in book 2! My little nitpack though is that (and this is me being totally stupid, to be fair)
The handling of grief and Bree's experience with it was exquisite and you could really feel that the author was pouring herself and her own experience into this. I cried several times.
Lastly, first person is my least favourite narrative (bar second person) and I generally don't like present tense, but in this book, the two were PERFECT for the story and the immersion (including physically!), so I didn't even notice. Below, I said "It even gave me goosebumps in a couple of parts." - ha, make that constant goosebumps!
23rd Dec 2020:
I love so much about this book!!! YA urban fantasy almost at its best, imo. Yes it includes a few tropes that have been done to death, but in an interesting way. I loved the Black history context of the story, really interesting, it's left a lot of thoughts churning around my brain. It even gave me goosebumps in a couple of parts.
Bree's grief is described and handled really well too (I teared up a few times), and Bree herself is an awesome protagonist. She's not perfect, she struggles and is suffering, but she's also sassy and strong, and proactive. The plot is paced perfectly, the story keeps moving along and we gradually learn more and more about this world and there are unexpected reveals along the way. I also love her friendship with Alice.
I rarely get on with romance in YA books, and in some ways this book was no exception but
I listened to the audiobook of this but I will be buying the gorgeous book as I want to reread it physically soon to take it all in more fully.