On Tuesday, March 4, I had the pleasure of returning to the world of #1 New York Times Bestselling author Tracy Deonn’s “Legendborn Cycle” series. I’ve been following Deonn since 2020 when I read her debut “Legendborn.” The protagonist Bree Matthews spoke to me then as a 17-year-old from rural North Carolina (Sampson County, baby!), and she still speaks to me as a 20-something soon-to-be-graduate.
If you aren’t familiar with the series, “The Legendborn Cycle” follows 16-year-old Bree, an early college student at UNC Chapel-Hill, Deonn’s alma mater. Reeling from the death of her mother, Bree leaves her home in Bentonville, N.C. to escape the suffocating grief and memories. But on her first night on campus, she witnesses a demon attack —which exposes her to the hidden world of the Order of the Round Table, a secret society descended from Arthurian knights who protect the world from supernatural threats.
When a Merlin — a teenage mage — tries to wipe her memory, Bree realizes another Merlin wiped her memory the night her mother died. It’s all a little suspicious to Bree, so she infiltrates the Order to find out if they had something to do with her mother’s death.
When we left Bree in “Bloodmarked,” the second installation of the series, she had just burned her ancestral streams, severing her connections for her foremothers and Arthur Pendragon, the legendary king whose spirit she inherited. Her ancestors were unable to help her wield her Bloodcraft in a way that could protect her, and Arthur, once a source of power, had betrayed her. In a desperate bid for survival, she struck a deal with the Shadow King: in exchange for teaching her to control her unpredictable magic, she would allow him to kill her at her magical peak and devour her power for himself. Naturally, “Oathbound” had me stressed out the whole 600 pages.
One of Deonn’s greatest strengths is her ability to make emotions leap off the page. Bree loves hard, and she is loved hard. Unlike the previous two books, “Oathbound” included five additional point of view characters. With this only being the third book Deonn has ever written, I didn’t keep my hopes too high for the execution.
I’m glad to say Deonn proved me very wrong. She perfectly captured the unique dynamics Bree has with the new POV characters. They see Bree’s love, her rage and her fear and refuse to turn away from it. I didn’t feel like I was reading these characters through Bree’s eyes, but I still understood the depth of the relationships with everyone. Even more so than in the previous two novels.
Bree stepped into her power in this book (literally). Where “Legendborn” focused on discovery and “Bloodmarked” on survival, “Oathbound” really leaned into Bree claiming and using the power her ancestors have left her with. She let go of their hopes and expectations and truly began living for herself, no matter the cost to anyone else. This was bittersweet but moving to see a young Black girl make this decision that many of us don’t even consider until later in life.
While I believe Black girls and women are indeed magic, we are still human, and Deonn writing Bree’s story where she’s able to acknowledge that made me feel all the things!
Deonn spent a lot of time writing about how Bree is inherently worthy of protection. Black girls never get that. We’re always expected to prove our worthiness for it. That’s nipped right in the bud. Bree isn’t protected because she’s a king, she is protected because she’s her. Bree’s true friends and family don’t care about her lineage, they just want her to be safe and happy, and I appreciated the clarity on that.
“Oathbound” was tropey as hell. Normally I would’ve rolled my eyes because tropes are so overdone in YA, but not for Black girls. Books with us at the center of them will never be overdone. We deserve to be able to see ourselves in masquerade balls and an angsty love triangle just like everyone else does.
The only part of “Oathbound” I’m not completely sold on yet is the use of one specific trope. I won’t spoil it here, but I can’t help but wonder if there was another way for Bree to accomplish the same goals without making the sacrifice she made in the prologue. I get her desperation, but I’m not sure that choice was in her best interest. Then again, desperation makes us do the strangest things. Nonetheless, I will definitely be tuning in for the fourth and final book. I’ve got to make sure my girl gets her happy-adjacent ending.
While it may be a little soon to call Deonn a master storyteller, I believe she is well on her way. Her choice to combine African American spiritual traditions with Arthuriana is the perfect vehicle for showcasing the power of Black girls while also giving us room to embrace all our emotions.
In the future, I hope to see Deonn continue expanding the rich universe she has created. While Bree’s story is almost over, I can tell there are still so many left to be told.
“Oathbound” is now available wherever books are sold.
