In my ongoing attempt to continue and finish book series I have started, I decided to finally pick up the sequel to Marissa Meyer’s Renegades. Which in turn made me realize I had never even reviewed the first book here on the blog. So I’m writing this more than a year after having read the book and many things have become hazy in my memory. But I do remember the most important bit, which is that – much like Meyer’s Lunar Chronicles – I really enjoyed this book in a guilty pleasure sort of way. 🙂
RENEGADES
by Marissa Meyer
Published: 2017
Ebook: 563 pages
Series: Renegades #1
My rating: 6/10
Opening line: We were all villains in the beginning.
Secret Identities. Extraordinary Powers. She wants vengeance. He wants justice.
The Renegades are a syndicate of prodigies — humans with extraordinary abilities — who emerged from the ruins of a crumbled society and established peace and order where chaos reigned. As champions of justice, they remain a symbol of hope and courage to everyone… except the villains they once overthrew.
Nova has a reason to hate the Renegades, and she is on a mission for vengeance. As she gets closer to her target, she meets Adrian, a Renegade boy who believes in justice — and in Nova. But Nova’s allegiance is to a villain who has the power to end them both.
Marissa Meyer’s second series, after her wildly successful and ridiculously entertaining Lunar Chronicles, takes a step away from fairy tales and explores the world of superheroes. Nova is one such superhero, or prodigy as they are called, who lives in Gatlon City. Her parents were killed when she was just a child and ever since then, Nova has held a grudge against the Renegades – the superheroes who were supposed to save her family from the villains who killed them. It’s a pretty weak reason to join a group of villains set out to destroy the Renegades if you ask me, but if you just get over that one glaring problem, this book is a lot of fun.
But let’s start with the basic set up, because things do get a little confusing. The Renegades (officially good superheroes) fought against the Anarchists (the villains) a while ago after an age of Chaos. Many people died and many more were hurt. The Renegades now are a powerful society of gifted humans with all sorts of cool, weird, or funny superpowers. The world pretty much works according to the Renegades’ rules and while they have learned from past mistakes and implemented a code that is meant to protect civilians, their decisions are law. It’s an intriguing set up that immediately poses the question of who decides who the good guys are and who the bad guys are. Because obviously, it isn’t quite that simple.
Nova is an Anarchist hoping to avenge her dead parents and destroy one of the most powerful Renegades there is – Captain Chromium. Raised by her uncle, Ace Anarchy, the leader of the Anarchists, she was born into the life of a supervillain, although of course she sees herself and her friends as the Good Guys.
Our second protagonist, Adrian aka Sketch, is a Renegade – equally born into his role as a superhero – who wants to take down the Anarchists. He also hopes to figure out who killed his mother, Lady Indomitable, and he also has a big secret. Adrian’s ability is to draw anything and make it real. So if he draws a worm, he can take it out of the piece of paper and it’s an actual, live worm. That’s a pretty cool power and Adrian has figured out that if he draws tattoos on himself, he can create his own new superpowers. As the Sentinel, his secret identity, he hopes to help the Renegades even more in their quest to vanquish the Anarchists.
The Anarchists decide that it would be amazing if they had a spy among the Renegades and send Nova to compete in the trials looking for new Renegade members. Nova’s superpower is not needing any sleep and being able to put people to sleep with her touch. As an Anarchist, she goes by Nightmare, but in her new Renegade identity, she is Insomnia.
You can see how this book can get confusing but the whole secret identity thing also makes it incredibly compelling. Both Nova and Adrian have to worry constantly that their secret will be discovered, so even during the quieter scenes, there is a feeling of tension. One wrong word and Nova’s scheme will blow up. She also has to try to work against the Renegades while keeping up the pretense of working for them. Adrian, on the other hand, never wanted his Sentinel identity to stay secret but a certain turn of events makes it necessary for him to hide it. So you can expect scenes that almost reminded me of romantic comedies where one person pretends to be two people, leaving the room as one character and returning as another. Adrian needs to turn into the Sentinel occasionally, but then he has to explain where his regular self was during that time, and Nova faces the same problem as Nightmare/Insomnia.
The plot itself doesn’t actually have that much to offer. There are exciting action sequences and of course a budding romance, which I enjoyed a lot. But there isn’t that much story there. Most of the book is concerned with Nova infiltrating the Renegades, learning the ropes, and hiding who she really is. Meyer does do some groundwork for what I suspect will become the overarching story, though. A side character named Max is held in quarantine in the Renegades headquarter because of his particular superpower. Finding out what that is was part of the reason I kept reading. The whole Anarchist/Renegades shenanigans themselves weren’t that interesting because, while fun to read, they never really pushed the story forward. Until the very end, that is, when some things are revealed, but mostly more questions pop up to be (hopefully) answered in the later books. This reads more like an introduction to a story rather than a story in its own right, but if you’re okay with that, it’s still a lot of fun.
Renegades also doesn’t provide much in terms of side characters. There are plenty of them but they are as forgettable as they are difficult to tell apart. It doesn’t help that each one of them has a civilian name and a superhero/supervillain name. As they all remain pretty bland and are reduced mostly to their superpower and maybe a quippy line here or there, I didn’t remember any of them (seriously, not a single one) until I started the second book. And even now (20% through the sequel) I don’t really remember them, I feel like I’m meeting them for the first time. That’s not a good sign…
I read some other people’s reviews of this book in order to jog my memory and I have now learned two things. Number one: Boy, this book got some negative reviews! Not hateful ones, but really thoughtful, critical ones that point out everything that’s wrong with it. I remember when I first read the book I was a bit underwhelmed as well, but now, a year later, I seem to only remember the fun bits. Number two: I have forgotten so much! Again, not a good sign, but considering how “meh” this book was received by many reviewers, maybe it’s for the best that I kind of blacked out all its flaws?
Many people had problems with the clichés but I just assumed those happened on purpose. Because this is a story about superheroes and villains… I mean, you’d expect some cheesy dialogue, flowing capes, and somewhat predictable battles, right?
This review is probably not what it would have been had I written it right after reading the book, but what I remember was really not that bad. Sure, the romance is obvious, the side characters were pale cardboard cutouts, and there wasn’t much plot. But Meyer put so much creativity into her characters’ superpowers and she writes action scenes so well that I found the read quite engaging. Her prose may be on the simple side, but its straight-forwardness makes this such a page turner. Renegades is clearly not be on par with the Lunar Chronicles, although those books too weren’t particularly good from a critic’s standpoint. I am an unabashed fan, however, and I am determined to enjoy this series as well, regardless of the many sensible voices telling me why I kind of shouldn’t.
MY RATING: 6/10 – Good
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