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4.38 AVERAGE
4.38 AVERAGE
The revolution has begun! After kidnapping (aka rescuing) Emperor Kai from his impending nuptials, Cinder and her companions aboard the Rampion hatch a plan to overthrow the evil Queen Levana once and for all. As they travel to Luna in hopes of rallying the oppressed Lunars scattered across the different sectors of the moon, they have no idea there is another struggle taking place within the Lunar palace walls. . .
Princess Winter has always been more beautiful and beloved than her stepmother, but under Levana's thumb, Winter is rarely able to get close to others, except her handsome personal guard Jacin Clay. Knowing that Levana would never allow her to be happy, Winter finds herself aligned with Cinder. Pretty soon dissent and defiance are rampant, and war is inevitable.
Princess Winter has always been more beautiful and beloved than her stepmother, but under Levana's thumb, Winter is rarely able to get close to others, except her handsome personal guard Jacin Clay. Knowing that Levana would never allow her to be happy, Winter finds herself aligned with Cinder. Pretty soon dissent and defiance are rampant, and war is inevitable.
A fantastic ending to a fantastic series! I was into all the different points of view, and the ending didn't feel like it was forcing itself to be tragic, or forcing itself to tie all the plot lines together in a neat bow. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and can't wait to see what Meyer has written for the epilogue when her Lunar book of novellas is released!
(2015 Reading Challenge: a book set in the future)
(2015 Reading Challenge: a book set in the future)
SMALL SPOILERS WITHIN REVIEW
"The young princess was as beautiful as daylight. She was more beautiful even than the queen herself."
Winter begins with the trial of Jacin Clay, guard of the royal court, for treason which was committed in novel 3 of this series, Cress. Queen Levana decides to spare him due to inside information he provides on a device that inhibits bioelectricity tampering, the adoration of Princess Winter, and the defense of guard Liam Kinney who is first introduced during this trial. This is when the inner monologue of the princess begins to reveal the extent of her lunacy caused by not using her lunar gift.
Meanwhile, space travelers Kai and Cinder are in a deep romance proving he has forgiven her lies and kidnapping. Joined by Captain Carswell Thorne, Cress, Wolf, and Iko, they plan to retrieve Scarlet, who is currently "pet" to Princess Winter, and remove Queen Levana from the throne of Luna and replace her with Cinder/Princess Selene.
This novel was packed full of action and suspense as characters are captured, injured, reunited, and love affairs blossom. However, it begins to become a bit tedious when a novel that could have been 400 pages turns into an 800 page story of a cat and mouse chase.
In the end, characters achieve their happily every after and everyone was brought closure. Overall had a very good beginning and end with an iffy, stretched out middle.
"The young princess was as beautiful as daylight. She was more beautiful even than the queen herself."
Winter begins with the trial of Jacin Clay, guard of the royal court, for treason which was committed in novel 3 of this series, Cress. Queen Levana decides to spare him due to inside information he provides on a device that inhibits bioelectricity tampering, the adoration of Princess Winter, and the defense of guard Liam Kinney who is first introduced during this trial. This is when the inner monologue of the princess begins to reveal the extent of her lunacy caused by not using her lunar gift.
Meanwhile, space travelers Kai and Cinder are in a deep romance proving he has forgiven her lies and kidnapping. Joined by Captain Carswell Thorne, Cress, Wolf, and Iko, they plan to retrieve Scarlet, who is currently "pet" to Princess Winter, and remove Queen Levana from the throne of Luna and replace her with Cinder/Princess Selene.
This novel was packed full of action and suspense as characters are captured, injured, reunited, and love affairs blossom. However, it begins to become a bit tedious when a novel that could have been 400 pages turns into an 800 page story of a cat and mouse chase.
In the end, characters achieve their happily every after and everyone was brought closure. Overall had a very good beginning and end with an iffy, stretched out middle.
Hold on tight, it’s a long book! But overall, I didn’t really feel like it felt too long. There were parts that seemed a little slow but overall I never noticed it feeling overly slow or long. The multiple POVs really help keep the story flowing.
Who knew that Thorne would end up being my favorite character!
I also loved the relationship between Jason and Winter. It felt a little bit like someone being in love with someone with mental or physical illness and it was a beautiful picture of love seeing beyond that and truly caring for them. Overall such a great end to a great series. I’ll miss these characters for sure.
Who knew that Thorne would end up being my favorite character!
I also loved the relationship between Jason and Winter. It felt a little bit like someone being in love with someone with mental or physical illness and it was a beautiful picture of love seeing beyond that and truly caring for them. Overall such a great end to a great series. I’ll miss these characters for sure.
I was looking forward to this book a lot. I loved the three books that preceded it. I even enjoyed the novellas and short stories a lot, although they're not really my thing. Unfortunately, this conclusion was a bit of a disappointment. I still enjoyed it, but it wasn't what I had been expecting. I had thought I would breeze through this in days, unable to put it down, like I had with the other books.
That didn't happen. Instead, I took almost a week to read it. It was still fun, don't get me wrong. I love the characters and I was happy to read the conclusion to their story. But this book has a pretty serious pacing problem. It is almost 300 pages longer than the book prior to it, Cress. That's a big jump, and the book suffers for it. There's a lot of action, but somehow the book still feels slow.
I think that the biggest contributing factor to the pacing is the sheer number of perspectives that this book contains. Winter. Jacin. Cinder. Kai. Iko. Levana. Scarlet. Wolf. Cress. Thorne. No sooner do you get into a character's story, then you're hopping into someone else's mind. It gets tiring, and it makes the scenes drag. I wish that Marissa Meyer had chosen to stick more closely to Winter and Jacin, as this is their book. I think it would have allowed the narrative to be tighter and the story to be more intense. It's hard to worry about what's happening to characters when you know exactly where they were and what they were thinking 10 pages ago. Also, I thought Winter and Jacin were both excellent characters, and I just didn't feel like we got to spend enough time with them.
I also had a few misgivings about the treatment of Levana through the book.because she wasn't beautiful. Like, how dare she pretend to be this beautiful woman, when she's really this ugly creature? I know that Cinder explicitly said that the burns weren't the problem, but there was probably a 100 page stretch where I still felt that uncomfortable undertone.
That said, I did enjoy the book. I think it was a worthy conclusion to the series. I liked the ending. I love the characters and I'm so glad to see how things were able to work out for them, especially Cinder. I had incredibly high expectations for this book, so it's not too shocking that it fell a little short. I will certainly be keeping an eye out for future works from Meyer. I really like her style, and I look forward to seeing how she will continue to develop it in the future.
That didn't happen. Instead, I took almost a week to read it. It was still fun, don't get me wrong. I love the characters and I was happy to read the conclusion to their story. But this book has a pretty serious pacing problem. It is almost 300 pages longer than the book prior to it, Cress. That's a big jump, and the book suffers for it. There's a lot of action, but somehow the book still feels slow.
I think that the biggest contributing factor to the pacing is the sheer number of perspectives that this book contains. Winter. Jacin. Cinder. Kai. Iko. Levana. Scarlet. Wolf. Cress. Thorne. No sooner do you get into a character's story, then you're hopping into someone else's mind. It gets tiring, and it makes the scenes drag. I wish that Marissa Meyer had chosen to stick more closely to Winter and Jacin, as this is their book. I think it would have allowed the narrative to be tighter and the story to be more intense. It's hard to worry about what's happening to characters when you know exactly where they were and what they were thinking 10 pages ago. Also, I thought Winter and Jacin were both excellent characters, and I just didn't feel like we got to spend enough time with them.
I also had a few misgivings about the treatment of Levana through the book.
Spoiler
I was kind of disturbed by the reactions to Levana's unglamoured form. I can understand horror as a reaction. Levana's severely burned, and the contrast to the beauty of her glamour is huge. But at the same time, I felt like there was a weird undertone of hate for herThat said, I did enjoy the book. I think it was a worthy conclusion to the series. I liked the ending. I love the characters and I'm so glad to see how things were able to work out for them, especially Cinder. I had incredibly high expectations for this book, so it's not too shocking that it fell a little short. I will certainly be keeping an eye out for future works from Meyer. I really like her style, and I look forward to seeing how she will continue to develop it in the future.
I absolutely love this series. I really do. The characters, the plot, the humor, all of it. This was my second reread and I listened via audio book and enjoyed every minute. Is this a deep make you think book? Nope, but it’s adventure and fun and found family and everything I love in a book.
Too much blood and fighting for my taste...and so drawn out!
One of my goals this year was to start and finish a full series. I chose this one because it was all available at the local library and it was YA so I thought it would be easy. Plus, fairytales. Haha! I wish. This final book was SO long. 680 pages on my e-reader. Too long, in my opinion, and full of too much faffing and padding. While I enjoyed the earlier novels of the series as silly fun, this book just draaagged. It felt like the author turned away from the silly fun of earlier books and suddenly tried to turn serious at the end.
My other problem was that EACH book had to push a romance between the title character and someone else. After the 3rd or 4th time this happened, it grew frustrating, and felt somewhat contrived and forced. Each character seemed so unconfident in their own romance/part/worthiness even when it was obvious that it grew frustrating and boring.
Also - why didn't the evil queen just kill them? I went back and checked, and EVERY single character at some point had been caught and imprisoned in some way by her during the series and they always seemed to get away - and easily enough too. For an evil queen not afraid of blood and cruelty with a love of control, she was really, really bad at keeping control of a clutch of fairytale characters.
Anyway, if the book had been half the length I may have liked it, but it just took too long to read. This is always my issue with series' - my interest wanes in them as the number of books grow. Hence why I rarely finish a series. Hence my goal to finally finish one. But hey, I did it! I still think that Cinder/Book 1 was the best. (given my reading patterns, not a surprise at all....)
My other problem was that EACH book had to push a romance between the title character and someone else. After the 3rd or 4th time this happened, it grew frustrating, and felt somewhat contrived and forced. Each character seemed so unconfident in their own romance/part/worthiness even when it was obvious that it grew frustrating and boring.
Also - why didn't the evil queen just kill them? I went back and checked, and EVERY single character at some point had been caught and imprisoned in some way by her during the series and they always seemed to get away - and easily enough too. For an evil queen not afraid of blood and cruelty with a love of control, she was really, really bad at keeping control of a clutch of fairytale characters.
Anyway, if the book had been half the length I may have liked it, but it just took too long to read. This is always my issue with series' - my interest wanes in them as the number of books grow. Hence why I rarely finish a series. Hence my goal to finally finish one. But hey, I did it! I still think that Cinder/Book 1 was the best. (given my reading patterns, not a surprise at all....)