Book Review: Cinder by Marissa Meyer

Book: Cinder (Lunar Chronicles #1) by Marissa Meyer, 2012 by Feiwel & Friends, 390 pages.

Purchase: Amazon | The Book Depository

Synopsis from Goodreads:
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.

My Thoughts:
I'm not sure why I put off reading this book for so long. Maybe because Cinderella isn't my favorite fairy tale. But I'm glad I succumbed to all of the hype and picked it up because I tore right through it.

Cinder takes place in a distant, dystopian future, where the world has had to reinvent itself after World War 4. There are cyborgs and a very powerful civilization living on the moon, wanting to take over the earth. There is a terrible disease running rampant, threatening the future of humanity.

The twists on the Cinderella story are great. Meyer is able to keep up the suspense, even though everyone knows how the story goes. She has a great ability to freshen up an old story and to take it to new places.

Sometimes it did get frustrating how confused and down on herself Cinder was, but that was also true to her character and how she was brought up. However, she has great relationships with the other characters (even the people she hates provide good contrast). I especially love her little robot.

I enjoyed Prince Kai and how conflicted he is - not a straight forward romance. In fact, there are lots of great twists and turns in this book, some expected and some not.

Overall, I loved Meyer's retelling of this tale and can't wait to get my hands on Scarlet, especially because it is based on another fairy tale (as are the rest of the books in this series).