Powerless by Lauren Roberts

Do you like to read young adult enemies-to-lovers fantasy books? If yes, then the Powerless Trilogy by Lauren Roberts is the series for you! 

We would rate this book a 9/10! This is one of our favorites, and we would recommend this book for anyone who wants to get into reading. It's a mix of The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins and Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard. The book begins with Paedyn Gray living in a divided kingdom; one side is ordinary, and one side is called the elites, who have special abilities, while the ordinary have no abilities. These abilities were given to them by a plague that swept through the entire kingdom. Paedyn Gray is forced into deadly trials after saving the prince, and she forms many complicated relationships along the way. The prince she saved is also the kingdom's enforcer, Kai Azer, and he is also part of the trials. Since the enforcer is in the trials, they were made to be even harder in order to test him. This story shows Kai in the trials and Paedyn’s attempt to mask her identity as an ordinary and find her way through a kingdom of elites. 

Powerless was well written and had a great constant pace to it, which kept us on the edge of our seats the whole read. The ending had an amazing plot twist and just made us want to read the next book, Reckless, right away. The characters had a lot of thought put into them and were very well curated by the author. Overall, it is an amazing enemies-to-lovers book with tension and yearning!

The author of this book is Lauren Roberts. She started writing Powerless when she was eighteen and still in college. She lives in Michigan, and the Powerless series is the only book series she's ever written. The book was self-published three months before it was picked up by publishers. It was officially published on January 30th, 2023, and gained most of its popularity on social media. When you don’t see Roberts writing or reading, you can find her doing many activities, such as knitting, laser tag, hammocking, word searches, and coloring. 

Powerless has received an award from Barnes & Noble's YA fiction. Roberts is about twenty-three now and just published a novella to Fearless called Fearful, published on September 2, 2025.

“For every girl who has ever felt powerless.” -Lauren Roberts