Supernova (Renagades #3)
By: Marissa Meyer
My Rating: Four out of five stars
Best for: 14 and up

Superheros make great stories.

That’s why Marissa Meyer’s Renegades trilogy works–although they tried really hard to NOT work by being just a little too YA predictable.

The parents are dead, protagonist is an outsider, the adults are useless, token diversity (times a billion), government stinks and needs to be overthrown, forced romance, girl doesn’t know she’s beautiful, etc, etc, etc.

At least there’s no love triangle.

But those standard YA tools work for a reason, and I had fun reading about these double agent superheros despite all the times they drove me crazy.

Think X-Men, but these mutants are called prodigies. A bad guy prodigy spy poses as a good guy prodigy, infiltrates their HQ, becomes friends with the good guy prodigies, and ends up saving the day by helping the good guy prodigies defeat the bad guy prodigies. Are the bad guys really all bad? Are the good guys really all good? Is there a way for us to all just be friends?

Such deep questions.

No sex, no language. A bit of violence. Some parents may want to know one of the main characters has two dads, and we’re reminded about it A LOT in the first book in particular. (See above comment on token diversity).

If you’re looking for mindless YA fun and you don’t care about details like reality and good decision making, then you’ll probably enjoy Renegades! I especially liked the little twist at the end–I saw most of it coming, but there was a great surprise in the last pages after I thought all the surprises were over.

Best for 14 and up.

Happy Reading!