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Review: Renegades

Renegades Renegades by Marissa Meyer
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

The superhero genre is as old as time itself. It feels like every month there’s a new superhero movie out in theatres, and now the genre is becoming more prevalent in the non-comic book world as well. Before reading Renegades I said to myself, “What in the world could Marissa Meyer have to add to this already exhausted genre?” Well... Somehow, someway, she did.

This book was subverting my expectations since before it even began, starting in the prologue. (view spoiler) The twists and the turns only continued on from there and it ended up being an unexpectedly refreshing read. There is no info-dumping, as the world-building is done so excruciatingly slowly that I was filled up with so many unanswered questions that I physically could not control myself as I could. Not. Stop. Reading!! This book had me stay up until 4am a couple times. Dangerous book!! I think it added a lot to my experience the fact that I had literally zero idea what Renegades was going to be about (besides the fact that it had superheros), much less than what you’ll have once you finish reading this review or any other. It also definitely helped that I don't really have too much prior experience with American superheroes, so I don't recognize the tropes as annoying or bad.

The world reminded me of that of My Hero Academia’s, in that they’ve established some sort of government system that prohibits the use of superpowers in public unless you have some sort of hero licence/affiliation. Where they could essentially both take place in the same world, each series focuses in on a different aspect of it and so each feels fundamentally unique from the other. Renegades focuses in on the idea of people not wanting to tie down what makes them unique, and therefore rebel against the law. I loved how one of the narrators, Nova, was one of these rebels and therefore we essentially had one of the “villains” at the front and centre of the novel. Our other voice was that of Adrian, someone very much entrenched in the “good guys” side of the coin, so it was very enjoyable to be able to read from both perspectives. This was one of the things that made Stephen King’s Mr. Mercedes so engrossing, and Meyer also managed to use the technique well.

We’re all probably familiar with the concept of “anti-heros”, but this felt like a new spin on it. Nova isn’t really a “hero” at all, but at the same time she’s not “evil” either, which was a concept I found myself struggling a lot with while I was reading this book.
“There was potential for evil everywhere, and the only way to combat it was if more people chose goodness. If more people chose heroism.
Not laziness. Not Apathy. Not indifference.”-Nova Artino

I don't know why but it took me a long time to realize that Nova isn't evil. During most of the book I had been complaining to myself about how "Ooh she's not evil enough," and it was something that was bugging and disappointing me. When I read that quote it finally hit me and I finally realized that I had been understanding her character wrong all along! (view spoiler) Her goal from the very beginning was just for everybody to be free from tyranny. She had been basically beating me over the head with this during the whole book, but I never payed attention because I wanted an evil main character. And in the end she is the same character, independant of how I initially perceived her, and if anything this revelation only heightened my enjoyment of the book because I realized I was bitching about nothing.

I’m usually a very character-oriented reader. As long as I like the characters I’ll tend to like the book as well. I don’t necessarily need a fast-paced or captivating storyline to keep me happy. However, with this book, I feel like this somehow got flipped on its head. I don’t think I really feel all that attached to any character in Renegades, and I don’t see that as a bad thing as I still enjoyed the heck out of this book. For once, the storyline was captivating enough to keep me utterly enthralled, along with the strong main lead. Nova was one of the aspects that made this book great, and the reason stems from the type of character she that is. I tend to never really like main characters all that much, and it’s because the types of characters I tend to like are always the more asshole-ish, blunt, play by their own rules, and questionable morals types, aka the types that are very rarely ever the main character. However, Nova is literally on the side of the villains and is in opposition to society and the other main characters, so that was an aspect that worked out really well for me and which I enjoyed quite a bit.

The other narrator—Adrian, is like... Okay and all... But he's a bit of a little bitch. (view spoiler) I don’t really have much that I can say out of a spoiler tag other than that… What I can say is that I think his power is OP af, and it is now my new preferred superpower that I would want to have. (view spoiler)

The promotions for this book included things like “What team are YOU on?!?!?!? Team RENEGADES or Team ANARCHISTS>!>!>>?!?!?!>?!/.FJHIPROMOTIONAL ENTHUSIASM” and I thought that that was the dumbest shit ever. Like, wtf? Who would ever pick team loser Anarchist?? And like, WHY? The villains always lose, ya silly willies. But, you know, after finishing this book I am totally #teamAnarchists, so I guess I am now a silly willy. (view spoiler)

Sorry if this review is slightly all over the place, all I want to do right now is read the next volume of My Hero Academia but I need to finish writing this, and I’m just trying to make sense of my jumbled notes and somehow make a review out of them. All I have left are some quotes I liked and I don’t know what to do with them, so here you go!

*Spoiler Free* Quotes: (view spoiler)

Spoiler-y Quotes: (view spoiler)


Some *spoiler free* background between me and this book:
(view spoiler)


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Click to read all of my Marissa Meyer Reviews
★The Lunar Chronicles: Cinder, Scarlet, Cress, Fairest, Winter
★Heartless
★Renegades: Renegades, Archenemies, Book 3



~~~~

A *spoiler free* reenactment of me when I finished reading this book:
(view spoiler)

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