Legendborn

3/5 – I'm going to be the person of unpopular opinion, but this book was just ok to me. I understand it is a cult classic, but I am not sure what was so great about it. I really wanted to DNF, but I pushed through. Here are my issues:

- The book was WAY too long. We did not need that many pages to tell the story.

- I was confused with the language and the telling of the magical system. All the words being used did not make sense to me. I had to locate a wiki fan page on the internet that provided a glossary of the words being used. I shouldn't have to do that for a YA book.

- It was very triggering watching Bree navigate through the loss of her mother only 3 months after her death because she was very unpredictable about what she was doing. Her decisions didn't make sense. These events all seemed to happen within a couple of weeks of school beginning. How is that possible? Did Bree ever go to class or do her work during all of this?

- The diversity was laughable. She was the only black person surrounded by a bunch of white people. There were a few other black/POC characters (Patricia, Mariah, Alice) but they were not in the story as much to make them main characters.

- The slavery trope needs to STOP. This book is supposed to be fantasy, so let's do that! I get slavery is a part of our history and I am fine with that, but let's be creative when it comes to telling black stories.

- The romance was weird and seemed forced. Nothing made me believe that Bree and Nick were attracted to each other.

With all that being said, the book was decent and left on a cliffhanger. I am curious as to what happens in Bloodmarked, so I will be reading the 2nd book. But the book is almost 600 pages!! WHY?? LOL