I did like this book, some sections I thought were a little dull. However I would like to see what happens next, so I will read the rest of the series. Starts off Adelina has a dad who is very mentally and sometimes physically abusive. while her sister Violetta is the prize for their dad. A massive plague went through the city and some children died or got the markings. Adelina and Violetta both caught it. But Adeline was left with markings and powers. Cast out by everyone including her father. She finds the young elites. And fights off her own Demons within herself. Enzo leader of Elites tries to help her.

Throughout the entirety of the book my thoughts were :"it's just an average book." Don't get me wrong, it ain't bad, but it isn't that good either.
I did like the portrayal of tiredness when using magic. It felt realistic. And the fact that our hero had to practice a lot before she could truly master her abilities.
I didn't like the slow pace. There wasn't much to offer plotwise in this book.
The ending made everything better. It felt realistic, and even though I was bored through the majority of this book, it did pike my interest for the next one.

If you’re exhausted and jaded by the current slew of young adult dystopian and fantasy novels out there, give The Young Elites a try! I read every YA dystopian or fantasy novel I could get my hands on over the past year, and quickly began to feel like I was reading the same old story but with the names changed. The Young Elites was just what I needed to get me out of that funk!

The Young Elites is a young adult fantasy story from the perspective of the VILLAIN. Yep, the villain! You’re initially led to believe that the protagonist, Adelina, is this poor, abused, battered girl who’s made to feel like a second class citizen in her own home. You can’t help but feel for her, the victim of discrimination based on something she can’t help: her appearance. You cheer for her when she finally gets her just desserts, exacting revenge on her tormentor for so many years. And then you begin to realise that she’s actually the villain of the piece. She’s not the poor little girl you wanted to hug and befriend, she’s actually volatile and nasty and filled with hate.

While I felt like Marie Lu’s Champion series was lacking in its world building, relying on that typical oppressive government/corporation schtick, I can’t say the same for The Young Elites! Much like Game of Thrones it’s set in an ancient world not too dissimilar to ours, in a society reminiscent of George R R Martin’s Braavos or our renaissance Italy. Several neighbouring nations were struck down by a plague several years back, which claimed the life of any adult it touched and left the children forever scarred. The children were changed in various ways - unnatural coloured hair and eyes, scars, missing limbs, “birthmarks” - and are shunned by society as “malfettos”.

Some of these malfettos have superhuman abilities, the strongest of whom are called “Elites”. Adelina discovers that she’s an elite who can weave illusions, causing people to see their worst nightmare or imagine that they’re in uncontrollable agony. She’s taken in by the Young Elites - known to each other as The Dagger Society - to learn to control her abilities and help to usurp the oppressive royal family. Unfortunately it’s not all that simple, and we quickly learn that Adelina won’t be the hero of this novel, she will get her way or she will lay waste to e v e r y t h i n g.

I am utterly in love with the world Marie Lu has created here! While certain elements are reminiscent of Game of Thrones, on the whole the premise and setting are different from anything else I’ve read. It’s an Italian renaissance society with a theological system similar to that of Ancient Greece, and magical abilities that only emerge once the wielder has been through a crucible: the blood fever. While their abilities are all tied to the earth and its energy - not too dissimilar from The Force in Star Wars, powers can range from kinship with animals, to dark illusions and pain, to airbending, to necromancy. It’s not laid out clearly in this book, so I am very curious to learn more about these strands of energy that surround everyone, and how the blood fever gave people the ability to bend them!

I’ve read a lot of dystopian sci-fi and fantasy over the last couple of years, so I tend to roll my eyes at the copy-and-paste oppressive regimes that authors drop into their books. While I felt that Lu’s Champion series was entirely unoriginal in its plotting of the North Korean-esque republic against the overly commercialised USA-esque entity, I really like how she’s constructed this society. So many societies in these genres oppress their people and kill non-conformists, but none do so in a way that’s so shocking. The way in which malfettos are hunted and murdered is not too dissimilar to Daesh throwing gay men off of buildings in Syria - they’re burned at the stake, bludgeoned to death, and otherwise mutilated for something they can’t help! It’s rare that I feel sick to my stomach reading a book - the few exceptions being Neal Shusterman’s Unwind, Gillian Flynn’s novels, and Alan Moore’s From Hell, but this book did it. Throw in a malfetto Elite who hunts fellow Elites and you have my attention!

I also looooove the inclusion of queer characters in this universe!

There were a few things I wasn’t thrilled with, however. I felt that the father’s ghost was an ineffective device and it was just a bit daggy, like someone’s Halloween costume of a white bedsheet ghost with the eyes cut out. Lu could’ve simply had the father’s voice in Adelina’s ear, constantly reminding her that she’s a worthless malfetto. I also anticipated very early on that someone would have the ability to negate other Elites’ powers, though I didn’t guess who it would be. I was also unsure what Spider’s gift actually was….?

Overall: I haven’t been this excited for a YA series in ages! Marie Lu has somehow managed to take renaissance Italy and fill it with a plague, magic, Greek god worship, Daesh cruelty, an utterly unlikeable “protagonist”, and make it all work. I wasn’t thrilled by her earlier work, but I now feel that Champion was simply Marie Lu warming up for the main event. Can’t wait to see where the series goes!

ABSOLUTELY OBSESSED WITH THIS! So good! I loved the characters and I am a sucker for Marie Lu writing! LOVED this!

Check out my review on abookishlifeforme.blogspot.com

http://abookishlifeforme.blogspot.com/2015/03/the-young-elites.html

Holy cow, this book was incredible! Now every time I look at it, I think, 'why hello extreme emotional trauma'.

Yeah, just a warning, when you read this book, (YOU MUST READ IT!!) you will most likely go into a deep emotional coma at the end. I speak from experience.

I NEED THE ROSE SOCIETY ASAP!!!! X.X