3.5 Stars 
 A fast-paced and entertaining dystopian, with a lot of cinematic appeal. Legend's simplistic writing and the youngness of its main characters lends it an upper middle-grade feel. 
 It has been touted as the YA version of Les Miserables (though many have found that a bit overly ambitious). The base plot is at least vaguely reminiscent of the classic's premise. The story is told in alternating POVs between 15-year-old Day, a poor thief of unusual athletic talent who is struggling to protect his family; and June, a wealthy 15-year-old military prodigy who is being raised by her older brother after the death of her parents. 
 At some unnamed point in the future, it seems the United States has suffered a socio-economic collapse thanks to flooded coastal lines and the resulting in-fighting. (It's not clear if the downfall was purely climate change--nor where the rest of the world factors into this. This will perhaps be addressed in future books.) From what little readers gather, the former U.S. has been split in half at around the point of the Rockies (NOT North/South, but East/West)--leaving everything East called "The Colonies" and everything to the West referred to as "The Republic." June and Day reside in The Republic which is, of course, a super-oppressive totalitarian regime with a tyrannical supreme leader--in which, all knowledge of the former USA has been erased. 
 June has completely downed the Kool-aid of her beloved Republic. Day lives as a wanted criminal, after having narrowly escaped Republic-sponsored genocide of all kids who don't make the aptitude testing cut. Their very different worlds/classes collide when June is assigned to hunt Day down and bring him to "justice." 
 What I Liked: 
 All in all, I did appreciate the crazed cult-o-personality feel of the Republic. It was very North Korea--an angle rarely explored in YA. Without being too graphic, the author didn't shy away from the kind of horrific violence that results from a government that exercises limitless control over its citizens. The touching on historical revisionism is an awareness-drawing bonus. 
 I also generally liked Day. He was refreshingly passable as a male (mentally speaking), and had an Aladdin-esque appeal to his survivalist do-goodery. He's a hero worth rooting for. 
 What Didn't Work For Me: 
 I didn't connect as deeply to the characters as I would have liked--the issue being especially problematic with June. She's difficult to sympathize with. How is it she's so smart she makes a perfect score on her military exam--twice--and yet she is completely naive to the fact that she is surrounded by sociopaths in a murderous fascist government? She seems to acknowledge enough things to be horrified at injustice, so she ultimately comes across as more foolish than brainwashed. 
 June's slowness on the pickup also contributed to the romantic angle seeming forced. I wasn't buying June and Day's chemistry, and felt like it would have developed more naturally if it had been left for later books in the series. The emotional hurtles they have to clear are simply too high for believability in this installment. 
 Another detraction for me was the sparse worldbuilding. What is the Colonies' government like? How did either of the warring governments come into being? Is there anything left of the world outside of the former United States? Also... how does a ruthless dictatorship manage to not be embarrassed that its public enemy #1 is a 15-year-old street kid? (If the characters had been 17 instead of 15, I might felt a bit differently about my believability qualms.) While I liked the bones of it in concept, it needed a lot more fleshing out for my personal satisfaction. Hopefully that will happen in the next book--which I do intend to read. 
 This is another one of those books that badly made me wish I could rate in 1/2 star increments. On the dystopian grading scale, I have to put it a bit above average. I significantly preferred it to Divergent, but felt it didn't stand up to The Hunger Games.