Prodigy by Marie Lu

You can read my review of the first book in this series, Legend, here.

*Spoilers for people who haven't read Legend*
In Legend, we were introduced to June and Day. June was the Republic's darling, the only child to ever achieve a perfect score on her Trials. Day was a legendary criminal, known for superhuman feats. When June's brother is killed, it appears as though Day was the killer. She goes undercover to hunt the mastermind, who turns out to be a young man from a poor family. He had failed his Trials and was supposed to be killed, but he escaped. Now he's a vigilante just trying to protect his family. June met Day, they started to be friends and then they like liked each other. Then, June set Day up, he was arrested, and sentenced to death. But...June started to investigate her brother's death and the Trials. It turned out that Day didn't kill her brother, plus he had also gotten a perfect score on his Trials, and the Republic sucks and they purposely unleash diseases on poor people.

Prodigy starts out with June and Day on the run to Las Vegas. They are looking to meet up with the Patriots, a rebel group looking to overthrow the Republic and reunite them with the Eastern United States, known as the Colonies. The old Elector Primo dies, and his son succeeds him. The Patriots plan to assassinate the son, Anden. Despite the Republic's publicizing that Day is dead, the people believe that he is still alive. Day has become a symbol of resistance. Therefore, the Patriots want Day to kill Anden in order to lead the country to unite with the Colonies. Whew, and that's not even the end!

The Patriots send June to get close to Anden and make sure that he is in place for their plan. She has herself arrested, but she finds out that Anden is actually a nice guy. He wants to change the country, stop the Trials, and even plans to free Day's brother, who was the whole reason they were working with the Patriots. Anden wants June and Day on his side, because they will get the people on his side as well. June believes him, but how will she get Day to help stop the assassination?

Wow, this stuff is hard to explain! Anyways, that's the main plot. It's kind of sad in this book how both Day and June start to question their relationship. June was (indirectly) responsible for Day's mother dying. She was the reason that he was arrested and his brother was executed to save him. These are fairly healthy road blocks to have in a relationship. It would actually be weirder if they didn't fight about these things. Because of their different backgrounds, they start to worry that they don't have anything in common. June starts to feel guilty for her wealthy upbringing, Day feels resentful for being poor. Neither of them are completely wrong. Usually, you have the romantic leads just getting past everything because: love. Not here, though. This is a dystopian, for the love of ice cream, not some prissy paranormal romance! It does seem more realistic. Sometimes you love someone, but it isn't enough. All those things that you thought you could move past, thought you forgave, they're still there. It still makes me really sad inside, because I am their fangirl, apparently.

Prodigy definitely outperforms Legend story-wise. It was exciting, there was tons of action, it was phenomenal. I really liked the character of June in this book. She is so smart about everything, I just love a girl who could take care of herself in any situation. She was the same in Legend, I just feel as though it was emphasized more here. I like Day a lot, but he was very testy here. He'd keep thinking mean thoughts about June, and how little they have in common. I would have smacked him if he had cheated on her with Tess. Seeing as the second book improved so much on the first, I cannot wait for book number three. It will be literally mind blowing.

I received my copy of Prodigy from Edelweiss, courtesy of Putnam Juvenile. It's available for purchase now.