Book Review - The Young Elites

The Young Elites by Marie Lu
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I struggled through this book for various reasons.

However, there were also plenty of things I enjoyed.

I loved the main character, Adelina, and her not-quite-so-good-and-pure intentions and actions. Marie Lu Did an excellent job keeping Adelina sympathetic while staying true to a morally grey - leaning toward black - character. For experiencing how an author would write such a character, especially one so young, was worth it.

I also enjoyed the ending. Events came to a satisfying conclusion, and there was a twist or two I didn't see coming, but made sense.

But I had to force myself to complete this book.

Without spoiling anything, there were events (particularly in the middle) which were not grounded in enough logic for me to find feasible. I kept asking 'why would they do that?' and 'how could they do that?' and never found an answer.

There were content issues I had - for instance a major flashback at the beginning of the book - and style choices that threw me out of what immersion I could get into, like the use of 'somehow', 'somewhere' and other vague terms; and while all-around I enjoyed the ending there were still a couple things that bothered me.

There were aspects I loved about this book, but if I had been reading for enjoyment rather than a character study I would not have completed it. Frankly were it not for the ending I would have rated this one star, but it wrapped things up nicely (until the epilogue, which having one is a pet peeve of mine).

Unless it is for further studying Adelina's character and how the author portrays her, I will not be continuing the series.

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