Briana, or Bree for short, is our heroine. Her mother recently passed and Bree
is deeply in grief but trying to put on a brave face and a tough exterior. One
night she sees something she shouldn't, something magical and dangerous near
her school's campus. After another incident Bree begins to wonder if what she
saw is connected to her mother's death. What she finds is more than she, and certainly
I, ever imagined.
Legendborn may be my favorite book of 2020. It is definitely the best young adult fantasy novel I have read in a very long time. It’s Black girl magic plus the King Arthur legend, with the complex history of the south and its legacy of slavery woven it. It all works beautifully. I loved this so much!
What I loved
Author Tracy Deonn has built a world that is complex, intricate, fun, and interesting. I went down multiple wormholes to learn more about the things referenced in the story.
It is effortlessly, realistically, and refreshingly diverse in terms of race, sexual identity, and sexuality. Better yet – it isn’t a big deal that there are different kinds of people in the story. They just exist, like they do in the real world, like they have throughout time.
“Growing up Black in the South, it's pretty common to find yourself in old places that just...weren't made for you. Maybe it's a building, a historic district, or a street. Some space that was originally built for white people and white people only, and you just have to hold that knowledge while going about your business.” (page 75)
A young Black woman is at the center of the story but there is no pretense that racism, sexism, or any other kind of -ism doesn’t exist. When Bree and her best-friend/roommate Alice get called in to a dean’s office, it doesn’t escape Bree’s attention when the dean calls Alice passive (Alice is Taiwanese American) and says that Bree has an attitude. Nor does it escape her (or the reader’s attention) that Bree gets involved with a secret society where people who look like her aren’t usually part of the membership.
“…there is an invisible energy all around us, everywhere in the world, that only some people know about. Some of those people call it magic, some call it aether, some call it spirit, and we call it root. There is no single school of thought about this energy? Is it an element? A natural resource? I think it is both, but a practitioner in India or Nigeria or Ireland may not agree.” (page 223)
Different traditions are respected. Rootcraft, (a fictional magic system modeled after rootwork, a living folk tradition and spiritual practice developed by enslaved Africans and their descendants under American chattel slavery, according to the Author’s Note) is on equal footing with the Arthurian legend.
Bree is a fully realized character. While fighting demons she also deals with grief and intergenerational trauma. Her parents are loving and intelligent, but not perfect. Bree is smart, but certainly not perfect.
I couldn't put this book down. It was fun and deeply emotional. Every time I picked up the book I got lost in the story. This book kept me up late reading, and got me up early to read more. There will sure be a sequel and I want it now!
