Legacy by Cayla Kluver
Posted by dorolerium on Sunday, November 1st, 2009
The Crown Princess of Hytanica, Alera, is expected to choose a husband within the next year. She hates her fathers first choice, Lord Steldor, and finds herself in love with another man. In the midst of all kinds of turmoil, and on the brink of war, Alera must decide if she’ll follow her heart or her duty to Hytanica.
Alera is both a fascinating and frustrating character to read. I found myself seeing the choices she was making and willing her to make different ones in a lot of cases, hoping she’d make the choices I would make were I in her position. The majority of the story centers around her – whether it’s time she spends with Steldor, stubbornly disobeying the adults in her life, or visiting with the mysterious and newly arrived Narian. It’s a good story, and an interesting perspective on palace life in a fantasy world.
The author of Legacy is sixteen-year-old Cayla Kluver, I was a little wary about this book given that she is so young. There’s no doubt in my mind that a young author can be a good one, but I wondered, will she write something that an adult would also like. The answer is a resounding yes!
I found myself sucked into this story, worrying about all the characters and wondering what was going to happen next. I genuinely feared for some of them during the dangerous parts of the book; hated Steldor’s actions and personality; loved the mystery that accompanied Narian. And the Glamour reader in me loved the descriptions of the clothes!
Though the book is over 450 pages, it was one of the fastest reads I’ve ever experienced. The writing was easy to read and the story so engaging that I was just turning page after page. Each chapter also begins with an intricate drawing around the first letter, which I really loved and found both endearing and fitting with the story. The pictures actually match pretty closely with what happens in the chapter, so I found it quite fun to go back and look at them after reading part of or the whole chapter.
I was especially anxious toward the end of the book, as more and more things start coming together and you really wonder how on earth can everything be resolved! I had no idea, up until the end of the book, that there are at least two more books in the works after this. And as a what happens next kind of person, I am thrilled to see that I’ll have more of Alera and her story in the future.
Read this book if: You like YA fiction and romance. I think this is especially a good book for a teen reader, and in my opinion it’s a good precursor to historical fiction.
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