Once upon a time, in a plague-ridden future, Cinderella was a cyborg supporting herself and her adoptive family as a skilled mechanic.
Marissa Meyer's inventive debut novel opens with 16-year-old Cinder yanking her foot from the socket where the screws are rusting. As she waits for Iko, her android assistant and constant companion, to return with a proper-size foot, a customer arrives at her booth at the weekly marketplace. Cinder recognizes him before her retina display finishes scanning his features: Prince Kaito, crown prince of the Eastern Commonwealth.
Meyer creates a feminist fairytale for modern teens. The prince comes to Cinder because she is the most talented mechanic in the land. He needs her to fix his android before the upcoming festival. They meet as equals. Just after his departure from her shop, Cinder hears a scream. It's her neighbor, a baker who has contracted the plague, and an emergency hover arrives to quarantine her. After placing these cornerstone elements, the author builds a coming-of age story layered with an intergalactic threat of war and plague. Meyer's twists yield tantalizing paradoxes. Cinder knows little of her past, and her search for her identity leads to her sense of purpose. Her stepmother's betrayal in enlisting Cinder into the cyborg draft introduces her to Dr. Erland, in close proximity to the royal family, who provides some key revelations.
This thought-provoking take on Cinderella comes to a satisfying close, and puts in place the markers for the heroine's larger journey. --Jennifer M. Brown, children's editor, Shelf Awareness
For more on Cinder, check out our Maximum Shelf.