2015 Reading Challenge: Cinder by Marissa Meyer

A book by a female author...

(Okay, first of all, I find it weird that "a book by a female author" would be one of my challenge criteria. Like...do you think I specifically avoid books by female authors, and this will expand by focus? Half the time, I barely even notice the author's name when I read a book. But I know it's sadly true that sometimes publishers alter an author's name so people won't know their gender [J.K. Rowling being a prominent example], and to those people who don't buy a book because it's written by a female, shame on you.)

Anyways.

Synopsis: 

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 rating: 4 out of 5 (I'm giving those a lot lately...)

Cinderella. As a cyborg. Just let that awesomeness sink in for a minute.

I really liked this book. It came highly recommended from a friend, and I wasn't disappointed. Well, not too disappointed. Overall it was excellent. I loved that it was based off of the classic fairy tale, but really only slightly resembled it. You've got the wicked stepmother, the two stepsisters, the handsome prince, the royal ball, and even the pumpkin turned into a carriage (...sort of...). And yet it's so original that you mostly forget it's a Cinderella spinoff.

I loved Cinder, I loved the plot, and I loved the setting. So much.

But... I was disappointed in two things.

1) I saw the twist coming a mile away.

I'm not going to spoil it for you, but I guessed the twist ending about 50 pages in, and the rest of the book I was hoping I would be proven wrong. I wasn't.

2) This wasn't a stand-alone novel.

I mean, I knew this was part of a series, but I was kind of hoping that Cinder's overall plot would be wrapped up, and then linked to the other books. I didn't expect a cliffhanger, and I started panicking when I only had twenty pages left and important things still hadn't happened.

That's the only reason I took a star away. But really it was fantastic and I'm excited to read the rest of the series.