The Atlas Six

Libby Rhodes is a young American woman who just graduated from New York University of Magical Arts. She is exceptionally smart and an extremely gifted medeian with the power to transform matter. Her older sister Katherine died at 16 (when Libby was 13) from a degenerative disease, and Libby spent years researching her sister’s condition to find out whether she could have saved her with magic. Having eventually concluded that there was nothing she could have done, Libby is now at peace with her limitations.

Libby is described as “a doe-eyed brunette with an infantilizing fringe” (39), and she and Nico are the youngest of the six medeians. Libby is frequently underestimated by the others because, although she is powerful, they often deem her too insecure to be a threat. Nico notices that “all her usual flare-ups of anxiety were on full display as she twirled her brown hair with one hand, chewing her lip absently” (47). However, Libby often proves them wrong, as when Tristan thought he would protect her during the attack on the house but ended up needing her help. Summing up Libby’s strengths and weaknesses, Nico claims that she is “the sort of perfectionist who [is] so desperately frightened of being any degree of inadequate that, on occasion, the effort of trying at all [is] enough to paralyze her with doubt” (176).