Renegades Books in Order

After spending years reimagining fairy tales with The Lunar Chronicles, Marissa Meyer shifted gears to tackle a very different kind of story: the superhero epic.

Set in the fictional metropolis of Gatlon City, the Renegades trilogy takes place in a world recovering from a chaotic era known as the Age of Anarchy. In this society, people with extraordinary abilities are called Prodigies. For a long time, these powers led to societal collapse and gang warfare, until a group of Prodigies came together to restore order. These heroes, known as the Renegades, defeated the villainous gangs and established themselves as the new government, promising safety and justice for all.

But peace often depends on who is telling the story.

To the general public, the Renegades are champions of virtue. To the defeated villains—now called Anarchists—they are hypocrites who enforce a strict hierarchy. This is where we meet Nova Artino. Raised by the Anarchists after a tragedy that the Renegades failed to prevent, Nova has grown up believing the current system is broken. She has the ability to put people to sleep with a touch, but her real power is her insomnia; she never sleeps, giving her plenty of time to plot vengeance. Her goal is simple: infiltrate the Renegades and destroy them from the inside.

On the other side of the divide is Adrian Everhart. As the adopted son of the two most famous Renegades in the city, Adrian believes in the heroic cause, but he isn't blind to the bureaucracy that slows down justice. His ability allows him to bring his drawings to life, a power he uses to create his own vigilante persona, the Sentinel. He wants to protect his city, but he often finds himself at odds with the very rules he is supposed to uphold.

It gets complicated when their paths cross.

Nova joins Adrian’s patrol unit undercover, using the alias Insomnia. As they work together to solve a mystery involving a new drug on the streets, they inevitably grow closer. They begin to respect and trust one another, unaware that they are mortal enemies when the masks come off. Nova is secretly feeding information to her Anarchist uncle, while Adrian is hunting for the very people Nova is protecting.

Across the three books—Renegades, Archenemies, and Supernova—the story moves beyond the standard battles of good versus evil. It digs into the messy reality of running a society. It asks whether safety is worth the loss of freedom and if a villain is just a hero who hasn't been understood. Amidst the high-stakes action and secret identities, the trilogy is ultimately a character study about two people trying to figure out who they really are when the world tells them they have to pick a side.