Early Review: Scarlet by Marissa Meyer

Scarlet
(Lunar Chronicles #2)
Marissa Meyer
Release: February 5, 2013
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Cinder returns in the second thrilling installment of the New York Times-bestselling Lunar Chronicles. She’s trying to break out of prison—even though if she succeeds, she’ll be the Commonwealth’s most wanted fugitive.

Halfway around the world, Scarlet Benoit’s grandmother is missing. It turns out there are many things Scarlet doesn’t know about her grandmother and the grave danger she has lived in her whole life. When Scarlet encounters Wolf, a street fighter who may have information as to her grandmother’s whereabouts, she has no choice but to trust him, though he clearly has a few dark secrets of his own.

As Scarlet and Wolf work to unravel one mystery, they find another when they cross paths with Cinder. Together, they must stay one step ahead of the vicious Lunar Queen who will do anything to make Prince Kai her husband, her king, her prisoner.

Review:

Scarlet is the long-awaited sequel to last year's hit, Cinder, by debut author Marissa Meyer. I was completely in love with Cinder and had this sequel on my highly anticipated list. I'm happy to say that Scarlet does not disappoint, folks! If you loved the first book you will adore this one.

Scarlet actually begins with Cinder, believe it or not. Those of you wondering how Meyer would keep her promise and show us more Cinder and Kai in this book, have no fear! Meyer fulfills her promise by managing to weave Cinder and Kai's stories seamlessly into that of Scarlet and Wolf's and we get multiple chapters from each of those character's POV. It's actually rather amazing to see how everything comes together and how each of the four individual characters' own plots ties in with everyone else's. I am impressed by Meyer's ability to connect the dots in ways that are just complicated enough to be astonishing but not so complicated as to confuse readers.

Our new heroine in this book is Scarlet, loosely based on the girl from Little Red Riding Hood. She is very tough and independent, but at the same time likable. Her narration is similar to Cinder's, but you can tell the difference between Cinder's sometimes hesitant confidence and Scarlet's better understanding of herself.

Scarlet's love interest is, of course, a guy named Wolf (love it!) who is a mysterious street fighter. He takes an interest in Scarlet almost right away and I was constantly wondering if his interest was genuine or if something more was going on. I loved his character and all the unexpected things we learned about him as the story moved along.

Readers are also introduced to a new character, Captain Carswell Thorne, a helpful but blundering young man who fancies himself a ship captain. He aids in Cinder's jailbreak at the story's beginning and they spend a lot of time together during Cinder's plot line. I am really looking forward to seeing more of him in the next book because he is a wonderful addition to the series!

It was also wonderful to be back in the unique world Meyer has created with her Lunar Chronicles series. All the new fangled sci-fi tools along with the combination of humans, lunars, supernaturals, and cyborgs in the well-imagined future world is a fun place to be. I am now placing book three in this series, Cress, on my highly anticipated list for next year!

Recommended for fans of: Cinder, young adult sci-fi, strong heroines and fun characters, fairy tale retellings, and snarky artificial intelligence.

This review is based on an advance copy of the book provided by the publisher.

    

  5 / 5 stars

My reviews of other books in this series:
Cinder (Lunar Chronicles #1)