Book Review: Cinder by Marissa Meyer

Summary from Goodreads:

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 Review:
I feel I need to kick this review off with the words "I don't like fairytales". Maybe it is that I have my feet firmly on the ground, or that I haven't found the right fairytale for me, but I'm not a fairytale kind of girl. Nor am I a remake of a fairytale kind of girl. This is why I put off reading Cinder for so long. However, I finally picked this one up on several recommendations and I'm glad I did.

Let me say fairytales on their own... meh! Fairytales with cyborgs... awesome! I'm a science fiction fan through and through and I loved the combination of the cyborgs in this one. Cinder is a cyborg and she's under the legal guardianship of Adri. She has two step-sisters, one decidedly more mean and evil than the other. There is a disease ravaging its way through the country, called Letumosis, and of course there is a handsome prince.

There is all the elements of the original tale of Cinderella, but with a twist. The twists are definitely what makes this story awesome.

I liked Cinder, she's tough and determined. The Queen and her step-mother "legal guardian", Adri, certainly fill up the "evil" quota quite nicely, and there were quite a few other interesting characters, especially some fascinating androids.

This was a really good first introduction into what is a 4-book series and I'm looking forward to reading the rest of the books in the series.