Curled up in blankets, my Christmas tree glowing in the corner of my room, I listened as the spine of the brand new book in front of me cracked open for the first time. Little did I know that this moment was the first of many spent curled up in bed reading a book I never expected to love.

The Last Legacy by Adrienne Young transported me from my cold, basement bedroom to the beautiful port town she created. This town—Bastian—is home to gem merchants, traders, and shipbuilders.

When my eyes first fell on the beautiful cover of this book, I knew it was the one I wanted to read; not because of the contents, but because of the cover. The cover is black with a beautiful young woman on the front, her hair and eyes nearly gold. What really caught my attention, though, were the three words scrawled across the bottom of the book jacket: Duty, desire, and destiny.

From the moment the first crack of the spine reached my ears to the moment my eyes scanned the final word, I was enthralled.

The story follows an 18-year-old girl by the name of Bryn Roth who is determined to climb her family’s meticulously built hierarchy.

Bryn lived in a town called Nimsmire with her aunt for most of her life but came back to Bastian on her 18th birthday. She was not welcomed as warmly as she expected. Her family’s conversations were hushed when she was at the dinner table, and even the silversmith—who was not even part of the family—was trying to push her out.

To climb the Roth family ladder, and make her mark, she had to push through that. Bryn’s parents died in an accident while on a mission only a few years after she was born. Her mom made her claim by opening a tea shop. Bryn is determined to take over for her mother and completely open the shop that has been left to rot.

To do this, she has to prove herself to her uncle Henrick, and she goes to any lengths that she can to do this.

What starts as a story of a girl who just wanted to make her mark, becomes a story of a girl who is ready to go against any odds to free herself. She comes to realize that maybe this family isn’t what she wants, and she finds herself along the way.

She realizes that she is not some princess who is constantly dressed to impress, always wearing a dress. She is a young woman who should be taken seriously because she is a lot smarter than her family thinks she is.

Bryn, and the adventures that Young has written this 18-year-old girl into, made me think about the life I’m living and if I really know who I was supposed to be. This fictional girl found herself in ways I could only ever dream of, and ultimately, she challenged me to make a mark just like she did. A mark that is unforgettable in the eyes of anyone who knows her.

Young was able to take a coming-of-age story and make it into something that this trope rarely sees.