Cinder by Marissa Meyer is a science fiction retelling of the classic story of Cinderella. The first in a quartet of science fiction fairytale retellings, Cinder follows a very skilled mechanic from New Bejing who also happens to be a cyborg named Cinder. Cinder, who is constantly at odds with her stepmother, who believes she is useless and blames her for step-sister’s sudden illness, becomes tangled in the life of Prince Kai. Trapped between fulfilling the desires of an evil and dangerous queen and a dangerous temptation, Cinder must find a way to protect Earth’s future.

I have mixed feelings about this book. While the first 100 pages or so were good, the rest of the book jumps into a spiral of very predictable plot twists and a confusing jumble of alien powers that I still cannot completely understand. While a slightly predictable plot is anticipated with this book as it is a retelling of a childhood classic the portions of the book that do have to do with the plot of Cinderella really take a back seat in the book. The predictable pieces have to do with the author added plot twists that I could anticipate 50 pages before they were revealed. The thing that saved this book for me was the romance. While this book does fall into a few typical young adult tropes, it thankfully does not fall into the instant love trope. The romance between the characters is well developed and thought out, not occurring instantly as romance can with many young adult novels. The romance was so good that I will be continuing to the next book and hopefully finishing out the series just to find out what happens to the romance between the two characters. All in all, I would not recommend this book and would rate it a 3.5 out of 5 stars.

Reviewed by Emily Silva