Lazy Book Lovers: Blog Tour: The Legacy by Necole Ryse

The Legacy by Necole Ryse
Publication Date: June 17, 2014
Published: Necole Ryse
Source: Received copy for honest review

My Rating:

Nineteen-year-old Raevyn Jones has never worn a designer gown. She's never had access to unlimited champagne or chauffeured limo rides.
But when she is dropped in the midst of the Black Ivy League--against her will--she has to pretend that everything is normal, as if she belongs.
When her new friends start to question her sketchy past and her shaky legacy at Benjamin Wallace Fitzgerald University, Raevyn realizes she will have to rely on her street smarts more than ever before.

Raevyn starts to receive cryptic text messages and emails from an anonymous sender and she soon discovers that not only does someone want her to leave B.W.Fitz--someone also wants to end her life.

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This book had me by the reigns before I started. It starts off with 19 year old Raevyn being sent away from the only life she’s ever known and thrown into the word of “Black Excellence” at BW Fitz University, a historical black college. The whole situation seems like it is cloaked in an air of mystery. The way that her parents dropped her off seemed very sketchy. All I knew is that there was some kind of trouble. And once she arrived on campus, trouble is what she found.

The Legacy felt like a fish out of water sort of story. Mostly everyone at BW Fitz came from money and was a legacy of a former member. Raevyn’s father makes sure she knows that she is to keep up this illusion that she is one of them even when she didn’t have the same upbringing as the others. Most of the book dealt with showing the differences between Rae and her new ‘friends’. I appreciated greatly the look at successful and educated black characters. It felt like reading “A Different World” in an updated time.

I found that this story worked best because you always felt on edge not wondering if Raevyn’s dubious past would be found out, it was only a matter of when. Even when she would get close to Jeffery Vincent Eugene Donnelly the fourth, oh yeah, they all introduce their selves with their full names and legacies.

Along with fitting into this new world, Raevyn had to deal with trying to keep ties to the one she came from. I loved that she had this issue because it reminded me of the classic issue most have when going to college and trying to keep ties to their high school selves. With a boyfriend in jail and parents that said that she could never go back to Maryland, Raevyn had to make B.W. Fitz work.

This is a story of excellence and acceptance, mystery and discovery, love and loss. I loved so much about this book from having a black protagonist to even having an awesome cliffhanger. The only thing I will say is that at times it felt more of a high school atmosphere than a college one but other than that, I will be waiting for the next.

Necole Ryse graduated from Towson University with Bachelor’s Degree in Mass Communications.
Bored with life as an adult, Necole decided to follow her dreams to write fiction and she hasn’t looked back. She joined the Winslet Press family to release her first novel, THE LEGACY.
She enjoys chocolate covered pretzels, Criminal Minds marathons, and all things Harry Potter.

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