Cinder, by Marissa Meyer (Book Review)

 

“She was a cyborg, and she would never go to a ball.”

…Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth's fate hinges on one girl. . . .

Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She's a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister's illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai's, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world's future…

"Do you think it could have a virus?"
"Maybe her programming was overwhelmed by Prince Kai's uncanny hotness.” 

The Lunar Choronicles was recommended to me by my bestie quite a bit ago now! This book was one that started quite a series of books that made my summer this past year (I'm that behind on book reviews *cries*). 

First of all, the plot of this book. Being that it is a retelling, there wasn’t really any big plot twists to note that made me do any doubletakes—In my opinion. I have seen people literally react while reading this book, so.

It was pretty straight forward when it came to the storyline, being that it follows a very similar take of Cinderella. Only…sci-fi. And I know, that probably sounds ridiculous. We all know that Cinderella is a story about a stable girl who lives with her evil stepmother and stepsisters who meets a prince and then goes on to become a princess—trust me, I know. But now take that same story and set the scene in Asia and the moon, and make the stable girl a mechanic. Ta-da! You get Cinder. But while all of that sounds pretty crazy and even a little corny, it wasn’t. Being that it is also dystopian, you have a plague as well, you have people with special abilities, and you have cyborgs. Marissa Meyer turned one of my favorite Disney princesses into a asian girl boss with a metal foot (foreshadowing my favorite scene). 

“Instead of looking like a royal heartthrob, he just looked crazy.” 

The romance was interesting, although expected. I mean, you obviously know who Cinderella ends up with from the regional story, and its the same here with Cinder. But Meyer somehow fit the classic story of the royal prince and the stable girl into a futuristic novels, so I’ll give her that. While it might sound like being that you already know how it will end there is no point in you reading it—Pause. You’re wrong. This is the first book a a four book series, and in my opinion, this is the worst out of it. They only got better. Including the romances. 

The characters themselves (at least for this book) weren’t my favorite. Like is said, Cinder was kind of a girl boss, which already isn’t my favorite personality for a main character, and being that she is a mechanic—I don’t know. She kinda just seemed like she could could do anything, and that kind of made it hard to sympathize with her in that sense. Kai I did like a lot, although his character takes on a more political side throughout the rest of the series which made it harder to relate to him, when all he talks about his how to rule his country, but I did like him in this book. Iko is still a favorite though, and she just gets better throughout. 

“Even in the Future the Story Begins with Once Upon a Time.” 

So overall, this was a good book! While I wouldn’t necessary read it again, it was a good start to the series. I would give it a 6 out of 10 and would recommend it for ages 12-13+. 

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Tally ho,

Finlee <3