Red Queen -Victoria Aveyard

#youngadult #fantasy #romance #enemiestolovers

The Red Queen is a fictional book written by Victoria Aveyard. The plot revolves around a young girl named Mare Barrow, who grows up in poor lake regions and gains an understanding that she can manage electricity. When the Slivers (the silver-blooded upper class) find out she is a "Red" with powers (which is not known by the lower classes to have), they decide to recruit her to help them with the problems with the reds. This puts Mare into a dilemma because as the conflict builds up she starts rethinking whether she should put her commitment to her people or her well-being. Within the story, she is found to be working alongside her enemies, including the prince of the slivers, which makes an unexpected shift in the story, turning the hatred into love, which accompanies the theme of the story with identity, power, and society. The storyline in this book was interesting to me, and it proved the claim that opposites attract, with Mare, a red, joining the slivers of the upper class. I agree with the author's opinion that this book has different layers and plot twists because it does provide those expectations of going through the layers leading up to a plot twist, but I disagree with her saying that this book is different from many fantasy books. I think this book has its uniqueness, but it's not the most surprising one I've read because I think it has a lot of similarities with other fantasy books. Society and class matter blatantly in the book; it constantly raises awareness of how people get treated if they have less favorable living situations compared to the more fortunate and privileged. Everything tied in and fit them and the date of the story, so I don't think the book left anything out that could have been important to the plot. This book made me find a connection with the book "The Cruel Prince" by Holly Black, which shows connections with the main character working with the opposite side and having hatred towards them but seeming to be dragged towards the prince, whom she hates. This book made me realize the injustice the red side had to endure, as well as Mare's observance and determination. The Red Queen depicted a variety of situations that had an indirect connection to the real world but also had a fantasy aspect to them and dealt with a variety of interesting topics.