Legend (2011)
Legend is a 2011 criminals book written by Marie Lu.
Two fifteen-year-olds sit at opposite ends of the same broken country. In what used to be the western United States, the Republic wages endless war on its neighbors and sorts its citizens by birth. June is a military prodigy from the wealthy districts; Day is the slums' most wanted criminal, though his crimes may not be what they look like. Marie Lu alternates their voices as a murder pulls them into a cat-and-mouse chase, June hunting the boy she blames while the Republic's secrets close in on both. Brisk, plotty, and built on a sharp class divide.
Quick answers
What is Legend about?
Two fifteen-year-olds sit at opposite ends of the same broken country. In what used to be the western United States, the Republic wages endless war on its neighbors and sorts its citizens by birth. June is a military prodigy from the wealthy districts; Day is the slums' most wanted criminal, though his crimes may not be what they look like. Marie Lu alternates their voices as a murder pulls them into a cat-and-mouse chase, June hunting the boy she blames while the Republic's secrets close in on both. Brisk, plotty, and built on a sharp class divide.
When was Legend published?
Legend was published in 2011.
Who made Legend?
Legend was written by Marie Lu.
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Legend in our writing
- Companion guide: YA Dystopias: The Hunger Games and the Decade the Arena Ruled
A few thoughts on Legend
The Last of Us shares the militarized quarantine state, the hunted fugitive, and the slow thaw between two people on opposite sides. Les Miserables, which Marie Lu names as an inspiration, runs the same relentless pursuit across a hard class divide. The Hunger Games matches the prodigy-versus-rebel spark inside a cruel regime.
Manhunts across a country split cleanly by class
June hunts down Day across a Republic that sorts its people the moment they're born. The same country-wide chase runs through The Last of Us's trek through a broken, stratified nation, The Hunger Games' Capitol-versus-district cruelty, Les Misérables' relentless Javert-and-Valjean pursuit, the fence between two boys in The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, and the collapsing hierarchy of Lord of the Flies.
Trained operatives who start doubting the system they serve
June is the Republic's most celebrated soldier right up until its lies start showing, the same crack that opens in Fullmetal Alchemist's military, Assassination Classroom's trained killers, Rurouni Kenshin's reformed assassin, Ghost in the Shell's state security agents, and the government-licensed heroes of My Hero Academia. Each puts someone loyal to an institution in the position of finally seeing what it actually does.
The class-sorted dystopian America Legend belongs to
Marie Lu splits the country into a wealthy Republic elite and a criminalized underclass, the exact blueprint The Hunger Games, Divergent, The Maze Runner, The Giver and Delirium all build their own worlds from. Legend's June-and-Day split is this whole shelf's founding idea: two kids, two classes, one system deciding both their fates.
Marked targets fighting a system that already decided their fate
Day is the Republic's most wanted for crimes he mostly didn't commit, the same frame Arthur Morgan lives inside in Red Dead Redemption 2, the criminal-and-cop divide of Grand Theft Auto V and San Andreas, Gordon Freeman's fight against an occupying regime in Half-Life 2, and Chell's standoff against a testing regime that never intended to let her go in Portal 2.