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ArcherOfTheAsylum

Archer's Asylum

I'm a big bloke (7ft tall) and I am forever reading. This will mostly be my thoughts as I am reading and possibly a review or two. You may know me as Archer.

 

I am basically a lurker. My life revolves around my wife, my cats, Books, and entertainment.

 

I'm working on building and setting up a forge and I'm generally one of those people who can be found causing or in the middle of mischief somewhere...

Cinder: Book One in the Lunar Chronicles

Cinder  - Marissa Meyer Well hello once again…Let me open with a simple wow…Fucking wow…I went into Cinder with a touch or trepidation. Why? Because I’m not normally a fan of retelling classic tales. Especially Fairy-tales. It doesn’t need to be done and nine times out of ten it ruins the story… for everyone. So to say I was a little bit unsure of my choice when I loaded this onto my Kindle is a mild understatement. So knowing that, imagine my surprise when I find this book to be predictable… every revelation that came out in the story I had called, I’d figured out the significance of Cinder from the foreshadowing within the first act of the book. To say that it was obvious is like trying to say that Jimi Hendrix smoked pot. It serves no great purpose but makes you look like an utter fool. But I expected nothing less; this is a reworking of Cinderella after all. Albeit a sci-fi retelling, set in New Beijing after the Fourth World War, that right folks we’re only half way there (anyone to make an obvious Bon Jovi joke is just uninspired). Yet when I put my Kindle down and rubbed my eyes making coffee… I found myself wondering… I wonder if I’m right about what happens next?I was on Marissa Meyers hook. Cinder had me by the balls… and like the president said, my heart and my mind surely followed. I was sucked into the world of Cinder. The (almost, but not quite) utopian commonwealth. The plague. The cyborgs. The evil bitch queen from the moon… and I didn’t care… Everything was Cinder and nothing hurt. I didn’t care that it was predictable, I didn’t care that it was obvious. The flow of the writing drew me away with the current. The prose had immense elegance in its simplicity. This is a rework of a classic story that works. Honestly, for those of you who know me you will know I am fairly unforgiving when it comes to YA. A lot of YA authors believe that being in the YA category is an anathema to quality. But you know what there are authors out there (Rachel Hartman, Susan Ee… come on down and pick a prize) that have gone out of their way to prove that it’s not… and now Marissa Meyer is among them. Now don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a perfect novel. There was the odd typo and misused word but by and large… it was monstrously enjoyable. If Ms Meyer had picked an original basis, maybe this would still work, but I suspect it wouldn’t. Honestly I can’t, in my heart of hearts, find any serious fault with book on my own personal level. Hell I’ll read it to my kids, when I have some… and when they’re about 7 or 8 wanting story time. I’d recommend it to just about anyone who wants the nostalgia of a familiar fairy story, with the refreshing wonder of a well crafted Sci-Fi world.Archer… OUT!P.S. I'm only docking a star because it's predictable. ~: Review also on my blogDevil's Advocate :~