Monday, December 9, 2013

Cinder

It would be bad enough losing your shoe at the ball, but to lose your whole foot!--Now that would be seriously problematic. Marissa Meyer has written a futuristic version of Cinderella with a cyborg (human being augmented by mechanical/electrical parts) as her heroine, Linh Cinder of New Beijing. Set in a future after World War IV, the world has reassembled into 6 political units, with the Eastern Commonwealth being one of them. Cinder lives here with a nasty step-mother, two step-sisters, Pearl and Peony. Only Peony and the family droid, Iko, seem to have any affection for Cinder. Step-mother Adri blames Cinder for the death of her husband, who insisted they adopt Cinder after her life-saving surgery. But cyborgs are treated as 2nd class citizens on Earth, and in spite of Cinder's uncanny skills repairing anything mechanical or electrical--skills that provide the family's only income--Adri and Pearl are embarrassed about being associated with Cinder. Plans are underway to attend the annual palace ball when Peony contracts the plague that has been devastating the earth's population in recent years.  Cinder gets the blame for that as well, and Adri "volunteers" Cinder to be a subject for unfailingly fatal research on antidotes for the plague. But Cinder does NOT die, and a whole new set of problems now present themselves. Of course the parallel storyline is that the somewhat unorthodox Prince Kai has personally brought his royal droid to Cinder for repairs, claiming it is a matter of national security. The emperor has contracted the plague and if he dies, Kai will become Emperor. The Queen of Luna would very much like to get a foothold on earth through a marriage to Kai, but nobody on earth really wants that to happen. Then she offers a cure for the plague--the day after the Emperor dies. There is clearly a sequel(s) in the works, as Cinder warns Prince Kai of an imminent threat to his life, but forfeits her own freedom, and possibly her life, in the process.

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