‘Legacy’ by Shannon Messenger is the eighth book in the Keeper of the Lost Cities Series. Since this a series, I’m going to give you a quick run down of the series. Basically, Sophie Foster is a long lost elf who was hidden away with humans at birth. As an elf, Sophie has a special ability, telepathy, which made it very hard to blend in with the humans. However, in the beginning, Sophie didn’t know she was an elf, so she just thought that there was something wrong with her. Little did she know, she was the most powerful elf in Eternalia (her world). So, one day, in the middle of a school field trip, she meets the gorgeous Fitz, who happens to be an elf that is also looking for her. (*Side note: all elfs have the most beautiful blue eyes, and Sophie has brown eyes as a side effect of her genetic history). Long story short, Fitz takes her back to Eternalia where she attends Foxfire and takes all kinds of crazy elvin classes like metaphysics, element bottling, and telepathy. She also makes some new friends (Biana, Dex, and Keefe) who all are also extremely gorgeous. Sophie has a crush on Fitz, the one that found her, but, personally, I’m a total Keefe fan. There’ll be more on that later 🙂 Anyway, because she is so insanely powerful, she has people going after, and it’s up to her and her creators, the Black Swan to protect her from the Neverseen. The Neverseen are the bad guys in the series who want to bring the world under their control, and they’re willing to do anything to make that up. Over the course of the series, Sophie learns she was genetically engineered by the Black Swan to bring change to the world, and gains more special abilites.
Okay, so now that we’ve got a gist of what the series is about, let’s get to the book.
In this book, Sophie deals with fact that she is unmatchable, among other issues. Being unmatchable is a huge problem in her world, because it means that she can never get married under the eyes of the Council. So, she decides to find out who her genetic parents, as this will allow her to be matched with Fitz, her current boyfriend. But, this is a big problem, because that could cause upheaval in Eternalia for some unknown reason that Mr. Forkle refuses to say. This diverts her focus from many important problems, like her friend, Tam being captured by the Neverseen, and the fact that Keefe’s mother joined the Neverseen. Despite the fact that Sophie gets appointed to a noble status, and endures many other things in the book, this is still the main focus. In the end, Sophie does manage to figure out who her genetic mother is, and it turns out to be one of the Councilors, who are strictly forbidden to have children. Obviously, this means Sophie will have to keep this a secret forever. Rendering her unmatchable and unable to be with Fitz. As a result, in a very heartbreaking scene, she and Fitz break up, because Fitz is a jerk who cares more about the disgrace associated with a bad match, than Sophie. The girl he is supposed to love. Obviously, this was extremely infuriating, and had me rooting for Keefe even more. Keefe is the perfect guy for Sophie, he is sweet, and kind, and listens to Sophie and always keeps her together in stressful situations. He, of course, handled the matchmaking situation perfectly, and is head-over-heels in love with Sophie. But she doesn’t know that. Annoying, I know. Anyway, after this bombshell, all is quite for some time, but the Neverseen sends Sophie a message saying that they’re going to capture Keefe so he can accept his ‘legacy.’ Keefe’s legacy is a large part of this story, as it’s something Lady Gisela (Keefe’s mom) has been planning for a long time, and is supposedly world changing. The group scrambles to protect Keefe, but Keefe decides to hand himself over to the Neverseen. That’s the thing about Keefe. He is so driven to protect his friends and to stop further harm from happening because he feels responsible for it all. He’s been through so much because of his horrible mother and abusive father. The guilt cracked his mind and he has this martyr instinct in him, that makes him do dangerous things. It’s heartbreaking to see, because he hides behind humor and always makes people laugh, but he’s actually really broken inside.
So, Keefe get’s captured by the NEverseen, and his mother preforms some crazy ritual on him, using light and shadows that LEAK into his bones, causing extreme agony. Sophie finds Keefe, and using her telepathy, connects to Keefe’s mind, and tells him it’s gonna be okay. Unfortunately, Keefe falls into a coma of some sort and the books ends with Sophie taking him to a medical center. This broke my heart, because he’s only doing this to protect Sophie and his friends and SOPHIE STILL DOESN”T REALIZE HE”S HOPELESSLY IN LOVE WITH HER. It’s physcially painful, at this point. How do you not realize he loves you! Not to mention, this book gave me so much anxiety because the next book doesn’t come out until Novemeber, and I’m terrified that he’s going to die. All in all, I really love this series and this book is my favorite. I’ve read this book so many times already, and I’m never going to get bored of it.
Spoiler Alert 