Scarlet (The Lunar Chronicles #2) by Marissa Meyer

Published: February 5th 2013 by Feiwel and Friends

Genre: Young adult, Fantasy, Science Fiction, Fairy Tales

Pages: Hardcover, 452 pages

Cinder, the cyborg mechanic, returns in the second thrilling installment of the 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 or 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 is loath to trust this stranger, but is inexplicably drawn to him, and he to her. As Scarlet and Wolf unravel one mystery, they encounter another when they meet Cinder. Now, all of them must stay one step ahead of the vicious Lunar Queen Levana, who will do anything for the handsome Prince Kai to become her husband, her king, her prisoner.

My review:

I was a little excited to be listening to this book, because after putting off reading the first one, I enjoyed it. The first half of the book though, well, I was uninterested. But later in the book I found myself wanting to finish it, wanting to get to the part where everything comes to light. I wasn’t disappointed.

As a rule, I generally don’t read books with split perspectives. There are only four exceptions that I can think of right now. The Eragon series, Heroes of Olympus series, two books in the Throne of Glass series, and now, this book. I usually find them to be confusing and there are issues I have with the authors making clear distinctions in the characters. A few split perspective books I have read, I stopped reading because the author would use the same description of the same object or event for two different people, and that rarely happens in real life. It lacked character realness.

That wasn’t the case with this book, but I did still have some issues with the different characters. I can’t help but feel that there was a lack of depth to all the characters, and they all act very similarly, or have similar characteristics. I wish there was more of a distinction in the female characters, one that makes them easier to identify.

I enjoyed the plot of this book more than I did the last one, and I found that after a while I was actually very interested in where this was all going to lead and what was going to have to be done to make everything happen.

But, even though I can’t put my finger on any one particular instance, I feel as if there are some plot holes within the book.

Really, it was good over all, and it helped stave away the boredom while I was working.

★★★★ For a continuing great plot, but for the lack of character depth.