“You cannot harden your heart to the future just because of your past. You cannot use cruelty against yourself to justify cruelty to others.”
― The Midnight Star ―

I should have wait after i read the Skyhunter for doing this but i just can't wait!! And also since i have been binge reading her works, so i decided to just wing it anyway. So here we are guys, the third chapter of Author in Deep where i will talk about the author's works from the first book until the most recently releases.  Catch up with previous chapter where i talk about all John Green's books by clicking the picture below.

How I Met Her Works

I first encounter with her works by reading the Legend series. As you might know already, i judge book by its cover, i decided to buy Legend because of the cover is a promising one as a fantasy book, which turns out become one of dysopian series that i like (yes, the other dystopian books you probably can already guessed so i won't list that one since it's out of today's topic).  

Anyway i don't really know her personal life much, so we will skip that part already and go straight to the books she has released up until now (when i write this blog to be exact).

Whole Works of Marie Lu

 If you read my older post for her works you probably already know that she could be categorized as an author that move on from one project to another with another setting of world building, another plot, another character (of course) and succeed in it. I've talked about this in my podcast (listen to it by clicking here if you want to know more). But for more detail and understand what i mean, i will explain it by the release date of the books.

1. Legend Series

Day, together with June and help with the Patriots, a rebel group, leading a revolutions, fighting a deadly plague that has been spreading, infecting mostly everyone, including Day's little brother Eden also going war with the republic itself.

This dystopian book has become the big series in my heart that i will definitely suggest everyone to read it.

2. The Young Elite Series

Turns out the survivors got strange ability, some can control elemental like fire, wind, some with manipulations, and any superhero stuff you can imagine. And they call themselves the young elites.

At first when i read the first book i was expecting more of dystopian genre, but this book is different. A strong female character, with her own flaw, losing an eye because of the fever which made me count her as the one of diverse character. The girl who didn't afraid to kill, to seek for her revenge. Not only that, the plot twist also a huge blow to the face for me, which took this book to another level

3. Warcross Duology

In order to fulfill her rent bill, she tried to hack Warcross Opening Tournament Game to steal the rare items to later sell it out in black market. Yes she succeed to steal it, but she glitched to the game, which not only shocking all people in the world because it's not only a game anymore in this world, almost all populations in the world using it in daily basis. Hideo Tanaka, the young successful man who built this game, decided to recruit Emika to work with him instead of dragging her to jail for ruining the most important game. 

Emika, fly from LA to Tokyo to meet Hideo, not only as the spy to track down an entity who has been hacking Warcross world lately, but also become the player in Warcross tournament as one of the wildcard.

I find this world building as the best world building that i've encounter so far. I don't have problems to understand this kind of world building, the way Marie Lu explain it is just easy to understand, and i definitely would love to the technology to be applied in our real life

4. Batman: Nightwalkers

A bit different that the others, i would call this one as a retelling? since it's based on Batman story but Marie Lu made it. This also the part of DC Icons series, where lots of famous author participate in this projects, the first book is Wonder Woman : Warbringer, written by Leigh Bardugo, this Batman is the second book of the series, the third book is Catwoman : Soulstealer by Sarah J Mass, Superman : Dawnbreaker by Matt de la Pena and Black Canary : Breaking Silence by Alexandra Monir which will be released this December. The list will probably grow later since i think this would be all about DC characters 

i personally haven't read this book and others, but i've read the wonder woman one by Leigh Bardugo, and that's the first book i've read of her and i think for a DC characters (which i personally pro to Marvels if you asked) i think she did a great job for introducing the whole series. And again, because i'm not a DC characters fan, i stop there and decided to not continuing the series, although i like Marie Lu. I probably gonna read it in the future? who knows.

5. Rebel

Like the review of this book that i've recently posted, this book can be counted as the next season of the Legend series, where the main character is more focused to Eden, Day's little brother in Ross City, fighting the criminal who want to lead a revolution (just like what Day did in the Republic) but with wrong way and wrong purpose unlike how Day did in Republic. 

The Villain Dominic Hann is a villain that i would like because of the charisma that overflows him, his behind story really made me want to understand him for why he become the way he is. Like i said most of my review, i really like a badass villain.

This book is a revolution inside the revolution, just like as it said. The system of the world is unique, you will find a lot of similarity with the Warcross while you read it (because Marie Lu indeed want to write Rebel as the continuation of Legend series but it lead her to another series which is Warcross at first before she decided that she will continue Rebel) and i definitely suggest you to read if you miss Legend series.

6. Kingdom of Back

Living in eighteenth century, made her can't really compose her own music, because it's not how the world roll at that time. Her little brother, Woferl, in other hand is a nature born artist with amazing musical ability. Living in the shadow of his 4 years younger little brother, and such a tyrannical father just made her wish for being remembered, not just as a child prodigy accompanying his little brother.

A touch of magic is added in this book with Haymitch character, the long lost prince from kingdom of back, a magical world with mostly all backward things inside (specially the trees, just like in the cover of the book). Haymitch offers Nannerl a help for her wish in exchange for her help to take back his kingdom. Feeling betrayed by his father and the insecurities she got by overshadowed by her little brother, she accept Haymitch's offer. And there the adventure to kingdom of back with little quests begins. 

I would say this would be the least favorite book among her books that i've read, but i still have fun with the concept of this book, the story itself is something, i just don't know what to do with the characters in this book. Probably i need more eighteenth century books to read to objectively rate this book. 

7. Skyhunter

  This would be a new series, i still don't know how many books will be included in this series, at least they already planned the second book for this series (still untitled in goodreads by the time i wrote this blog). I already have this one in my shelf (thanks to the bookdepository discount event which i got it less than $10 for a hardcover of it) but i haven't read this one yet, i'm planning to start it when the series end. Yes, thanks to my OCD. 

All i know, as i guess by the cover (i might be wrong so don't count on me on this one) this would be a sci-fi book, probably traveling across the universe? or based on another planet or different world? i dunno, cuz i don't read synopsis (since i count synopsis as a spoiler) so i suggest you to read it yourself. 

But anyway i already expecting much from this series. Hope it won't let me down.

Why I like Her Works

As i already mentioned before, she's the type or author who worked on one world and move to another world building and success in it. Sometimes i encounter with an author who work on the first series, became a big hit, then they work on another and failed to hype it up as big as the last one. Marie Lu always took me by surprise by how much genre she tried in her works and she succeed. 

From dystopian to dark fantasy with elemental power, then to sci-fi gaming theme, to superhero, then to historical fiction which i would say super varied. A lot of diverse world, strong characters, which i would say one of her merits. Also, one thing i really like about her is how she is not afraid to bring "the ugly truth" in the story, whether it's the morally gray character, or the plot that doesn't really have to be like "Happily ever after", brutally ended, playing the reader's feelings. That's probably why i like her works so much. 

I really am expecting more of her works. 

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