Cinder - Marissa Meyer
Dear Curvy Blogger

There. All of you Meyer-obsessed readers have finally convinced me to pick up a copy of Cinder and read it less than 24 hours. You should be satisfied to know that I LOVED it! Don’t gloat, but it is one of my favorite reads of 2015 (so far) and I have already requested Scarlet to read from my public library. :D It’s taking me forever to review this book, because I once again feel like I won’t be able to do the book justice.*Sigh* the curse of a book blogger, right?

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Ever since the first time I  heard about this futuristic Cinderella retelling, I loved the idea of weaving a futuristic new world with an old and classic fairy tale. It took me years to work up the courage to read Cinder, because I was terrified the author would not live up to my expectations, like a lot of popular authors. I am here to tell you that Meyer took an old story and magically created something brilliant and brand new. I had the best time between the pages of this book. If you have put off reading this because, like me, you're intimated by your own expectations, I urge you to give it a try! It is a wonderful book and i can't way to read more by Marissa Meyer.

Cinder is not what one would consider a normal teenage girl of her times. She does not spend all her time cyber-stalking Prince Kai, heir to the Eastern Commonwealth Empire. She certainly doesn’t have the inclination to fall blindly at his feet. No, she has more important things on her mind – such as surviving special vaccination testing for the plague rampaging the globe. Whether it be through the draft or “voluntarily donated" by their owners, cyborgs from all over the world are being injected with letumosis in the hopes of finding a cure for the rest of humanity.

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In Cinder Cyborgs are humans whom have been upgraded and given a second chance at life. For some reason, this makes them nothing more than property to average humans, and they are pretty much shunned from society. Even though this book was far from reality, I found some real life themes that could correlate to our time and our own prejudices. Prejudice runs rampant in the Eastern Commonwealth – if you were anything but human, you are lesser or even evil. If that isn’t bad enough, the entire Empire seems to be run on nothing but rumor. Nope, I couldn’t draw *any* comparisons at all to the real world. *snort*

I liked how Meyer introduced the attraction between Cinder and Kai, but doesn’t take it upon herself to rush the romance like in the original Cinderella story. Yes, they are clearly in lust, but nobody is spouting the “L” word and I am glad about that! The book spans at most a couple of weeks, and there was too much going on in both their lives for them to actually get to know each other. I’m thrilled to see where Meyer takes it in Scarlet, because she ended Cinder on a wicked cliffhanger that I did not see coming!

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I found Cinder to be a cute dystopian tale with nail-biting scenes that had me on the edge of my seat reading through my hands over my eyes. I clicked with the characters – especially Iko! I kept imaging her as half android pet (Jetson-style), half R2D2 robotic gal pal – and the world-building was truly phenomenal. Cinder was heartfelt, romantic and funny, but ultimately a wild ride that I see myself re-visiting over and over.

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This review was originally posted on One Curvy Blogger