by Marie Lu
Part of Legend, book 0.5
First published 2013
June walks through the gates of Drake University on her first day. At twelve, she becomes the youngest cadet the military academy has ever accepted. Her world revolves around discipline, excellence, and serving the Republic that has given her everything. Across the city in the Lake sector, Day moves through shadows and back alleys. He fights for scraps of food and medicine while the Republic hunts him as a criminal. At twelve, he already knows the streets will kill him if he makes one wrong move. The two children live in the same nation but inhabit completely different realities. June trains to become an elite soldier in gleaming halls. Day learns survival in crumbling neighborhoods the Republic has abandoned. Neither knows the other exists, yet both struggle with the weight of expectations and the need to protect the people they love. Their paths will cross someday, but for now they remain strangers shaped by the same brutal world that divides them.
Genres: science-fiction, dystopia, adventure, action
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: enemies-to-lovers, found-family
Setting: Drake University, Lake Sector, Republic
Period: 12 Years Old
44 pages · Kindle Edition · Putnam Juvenile