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Let me preface this by saying that I love Young Adult literature, but that a lot of enjoyable YA is pretty much fluff, the literary equivalent of watching the Kardashians. So when I say I picked up Cinder by Marissa Meyer because it looked like some YA I would enjoy I didn't have astronomical expectations of this book. I was wrong. This is possibly one of the best YA books I've ever read and definitely the best in the past couple of years. AMAZING.
This is actually the first book I ever picked up based purely on a Goodreads recommendation, but the premise caught my attention: A retelling of Cinderella as a cyborg.
This is genre mashup to rival Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.
The book is set in a dystopian future more than 100 years after World War IV and is centered around a 16 year old cyborg mechanic named Cinder Linh (or Linh Cinder if you want to follow the Chinese-style name standard that the book uses) who has a chance run-in with the Imperial Prince that sets her world on end and starts an irreversible chain of events. There's a global plague, an impending war with the Lunars and an icy, evil stepmother to contend with if Cinder is going to make it to the ball on time, that is if she wants to even go.
You will be able to predict several plot events based on your knowledge of the classic fairy tale; but, if you're like me, you will revel at how seamlessly Marissa Meyer works all of the classic elements into her futuristic setting and story line. And, I'll admit, the major reveal in the last chapter was glaringly obvious to me within the first couple of chapters, but I didn't care. Watching the story weave towards the reveal was fascinating and beautiful. And Ms. Meyer, if you ever see this, Iko is so freakin' awesome!
All in all, I am extremely excited to get my hands on Scarlet which is the the next book in this four book series, the Lunar Chronicles. If you like fantasy or scifi or both you will thoroughly enjoy this tale.
That actually sounds super interesting. When you first said "Cinderella" and "cyborg" in the same sentence, I was a bit hesitant... but it seems like it might be something I'd dig. I'll have to check it out!
ReplyDeleteIt's really so much deeper and so much less gimmicky than I was expecting, really great world development and the characters are really well fleshed out.
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