Reviewed by Olivia
Rating: High Five
Who I'd Recommend to: Fans of Divergent, the Land of Stories, and everyone else :)
Synopsis (from Amazon):
Princess Winter is admired by the Lunar people for her grace and kindness, and despite the scars that mar her face, her beauty is said to be even more breathtaking than that of her stepmother, Queen Levana.
Winter despises her stepmother, and knows Levana won't approve of her feelings for her childhood friend--the handsome palace guard, Jacin. But Winter isn't as weak as Levana believes her to be and she's been undermining her stepmother's wishes for years. Together with the cyborg mechanic, Cinder, and her allies, Winter might even have the power to launch a revolution and win a war that's been raging for far too long.
Rating: High Five
Who I'd Recommend to: Fans of Divergent, the Land of Stories, and everyone else :)
Synopsis (from Amazon):
Princess Winter is admired by the Lunar people for her grace and kindness, and despite the scars that mar her face, her beauty is said to be even more breathtaking than that of her stepmother, Queen Levana.
Winter despises her stepmother, and knows Levana won't approve of her feelings for her childhood friend--the handsome palace guard, Jacin. But Winter isn't as weak as Levana believes her to be and she's been undermining her stepmother's wishes for years. Together with the cyborg mechanic, Cinder, and her allies, Winter might even have the power to launch a revolution and win a war that's been raging for far too long.
Thoughts: I'm going to start by saying that there are a truckload of things to love about this book. The characters, the strong female protagonists, the story, the incorporated fairy tales, the romance, the writing... I could go on and on. However, there were a few things that I found that disappointed me a little... just a little. For one, Winter's character. I loved Winter, I just didn't feel her as much as I did the other three female protagonists. This was probably the only major negative I had with this book - the fact that I didn't feel connected with Winter made me feel like this book didn't follow her story nearly as much as... say, Cress and Thorne. This isn't huge, just a little problem that I felt could have been easily fixed with a few more powerful scenes. The other problem I had was that this book, due to being so long, didn't follow the story of Snow White as much as the other books did with Cinderella, or Red Riding Hood, or Rapunzel. That was a bit of a disappointment, because Snow White is one of my favorite fairy tales. Again, it wasn't huge, it just degraded my reading experience a little more.
Having said all that, the multitude of things to love about this book definitely overpowered my slight issues with it, and I feel like this was a strong, meaningful, satisfying ending to the Lunar Chronicles. I'm sad to say that I was not left wanting more, because as I've said, this book was very long and took a while to get into the story. But once I was hooked, there was no putting this book down (hence the sleepy shadows under my eyes :). What I loved most, as far as characters went, was Cress and Thorne's connection. It helped build the story and I cannot begin to tell you how much I've been waiting for their happy ending together. Cinder was amazing to watch, and the action scenes, although the injuries were a little too abundant, were incredible. I couldn't tear my eyes away from the page even if I wanted to. The writing was beautiful yet simple and really connects with the reader. Meyer certainly is an expert at drawing unsuspecting readers into her brilliant stories and leaving them in suspense. I honestly could go on and on about this book, but as this is already the longest review I've ever written (besides for Brown Girl Dreaming) I'll just let you sit back (or, more likely, on the edge of your seat) and read this incredible story.
Whew. That rant felt good :)
(oh, and I'm putting this book under the Read w/ Parents Permission category solely because the romance does become a little... mature, for lack of a better word. It's way better than Divergent, which both my mom and I read together, but just a little warning. I'm 11, and it bordered on too much YA romance but never got there.)
Having said all that, the multitude of things to love about this book definitely overpowered my slight issues with it, and I feel like this was a strong, meaningful, satisfying ending to the Lunar Chronicles. I'm sad to say that I was not left wanting more, because as I've said, this book was very long and took a while to get into the story. But once I was hooked, there was no putting this book down (hence the sleepy shadows under my eyes :). What I loved most, as far as characters went, was Cress and Thorne's connection. It helped build the story and I cannot begin to tell you how much I've been waiting for their happy ending together. Cinder was amazing to watch, and the action scenes, although the injuries were a little too abundant, were incredible. I couldn't tear my eyes away from the page even if I wanted to. The writing was beautiful yet simple and really connects with the reader. Meyer certainly is an expert at drawing unsuspecting readers into her brilliant stories and leaving them in suspense. I honestly could go on and on about this book, but as this is already the longest review I've ever written (besides for Brown Girl Dreaming) I'll just let you sit back (or, more likely, on the edge of your seat) and read this incredible story.
Whew. That rant felt good :)
(oh, and I'm putting this book under the Read w/ Parents Permission category solely because the romance does become a little... mature, for lack of a better word. It's way better than Divergent, which both my mom and I read together, but just a little warning. I'm 11, and it bordered on too much YA romance but never got there.)
