A review by thepetitepunk
United as One by Pittacus Lore

4.0

"I am not Pittacus Lore. I am Number Four."


I've been reading The Lorien Legacies series for a very long time. It was this series that made me fall in love with reading, and I've waited every year for each book to come out. I'm sad to see this series end, but I'm overall satisfied with the last book.

United As One is narrated by John and Six. The world is in chaos as the Loric and their allies fight against the Mogadorians, with endless casualties affecting both sides. As the Garde and humans work together to defeat Setrákus Ra, powers are tested, friends are lost, and limits are pushed.

This book is full of battle scenes that made me feel energetic and alive as I read them at 1:30 in the morning. The burning desire to defeat Setrákus Ra keeps the characters going even during hopeless situations. This ultimate persistence highlights the credibility of the characters and their need for good over evil, which kept me rooting for the Garde. Personally, I think there may have been too many fighting scenes and I sometimes got lost with the battle strategies, but then again the book takes place amidst a war.

In addition, the characters in this series have developed tremendously. Going back to [b: I Am Number Four|7747374|I Am Number Four (Lorien Legacies, #1)|Pittacus Lore|http://images.gr-assets.com/books/1305807140s/7747374.jpg|10576999], John wanted to live a normal human life with a normal human girlfriend who went to a normal human school. Fast forward to the last book, and John is sacrificing himself to save the world as he embraces his Loric identity. Marina went from a girl living under the strict rules of her religious Cêpan to becoming her own strong, independent character who fights for what she thinks is right. My favorite example of character development, though, is Sam. Sam was the awkward boy doodling alien pictures in his notebooks and carrying around his father's glasses in hopes of seeing something beyond human understanding. He was bullied, friendless, and caught up in his own fantasies. As the series progresses, Sam gets to experience all the extraterrestrial things he wanted to find for so long. By the last book, he has his own Legacies and is one of the main contributors to defeating Setrákus Ra.

One problem I have had throughout this series is the multiple POVs. Even though the font for each POV is different, the voices of the characters do not always sound distinctively different. There was a part in United As One where I thought John was naked with Sam, and frankly, it was an awkward image. (I then realized it was Six's POV I was reading.) Although I love both Six and John, their characters out of all of the main characters are most similar in voice and personality. Choosing character point of views that vary in though process, emotions, reactions to situations, relationships with others, character quirks, vocabulary, etc. would help cut down the confusion while reading from multiple point of views. This book was written from two point of views though, instead of the usual three, which did lessen some confusion.

I'm disappointed that Nine never had a POV in any of the main books—his voice was unique and I would have liked to hear more of his inner thoughts and emotions. Even so, Nine's personality was still captured very well, which made his character memorable.

There are also many characters present in this series. Throughout The Lorien Legacies, characters have been introduced constantly. Even though John is the central character of the entire series, many other characters at some point have also been the main character. Usually the characters with POVs are considered main characters, but the POVs in each book are different. A main character in one book may not be the main character in the next book. Marina, for example, was a main character in [b: The Power of Six|8659601|The Power of Six (Lorien Legacies, #2)|Pittacus Lore|http://images.gr-assets.com/books/1345067406s/8659601.jpg|13530989]. She was also a main character around the time
Spoilerof Eight's death
. In United As One though, Marina has become a secondary character and this part of the story is not heavily focused on her. Although this is understandable—it would be impossible to go in depth with every single character—it washes away some of the aspects I loved about certain characters. In a few of the novellas, the care and determination of Adam's character is shown. We get to see how opposed he is to the ways of the Mogadorians, and how he fights relentlessly for what he thinks his right. Even though Adam obviously is on the Garde's side in the book, we lose the sense of struggle he went through with One and his family. I know that some characters are more important than others, but the secondary characters could have done more feeling rather than just doing. (This doesn't apply to every single secondary character.)

It's difficult to tie all the events and characters together by the end of a series in a satisfying way, especially if the series has many books and many characters, all with their own backgrounds, problems, desires, and struggles. Fortunately, the ending met my expectations. The right amount of suffering and triumph was expressed in the last few scenes of the book. When John visited the characters in the epilogue, how each person decided to live their life after the war was shown. I appreciated the fact that not every character simply left all the previous disastrous events behind and then lived a peaceful and content life. The various responses to life after the war added a realistic element to the story.

I'm glad the series ended on a mostly positive note; I can close my book without feeling like I've been deprived of important details, leaving me with no closure. I'm going to miss the Garde, but this has been a great adventure.

(Oh, and that last line of the book? I absolutely loved it.)