In light of the “Hunger Games”’ mass market success, several books following its release are seen trying to match the trilogy, Books like “Divergent” and “Maze Runner” can be noted as some of the more famous successors diving into a post-apocalyptic world in which, commonly, one main character had to, in some way, overthrow the government. “The Lunar Chronicles” by Marrissa Meyer is one of the lesser talked about but most influential — it is based on futuristic takes on popular fairy tales:.
The first book in the series Cinder (based on the Grimm Brothers’ Cinderella) fed the demand for YA dystopian novels. It is set in a sci-fi world in which Linh Cinder, a cyborg, is grappling with society’s disdain for cyborgs. She becomes forced into a job with the prince while she attempts to save her sister Peony from a plague afflicting the characters in her world. The way Meyer’s prose flows in nearly every one of her books is very based on visuals and a movie-like scene can be pictured with almost every description in this book. Meyer’s plot is intentionally similar to that of the fairytale she is retelling but the twist in this book is that there exists a dangerous race of people from the moon.
“The Lunar Chronicles” was one of the first popular YA series to introduce the idea of different books within the same series for different characters, whose storylines would eventually all come together and intertwine. The second book in this series, “Scarlett”, is a Red Riding Hood retelling. Scarlett lives in the same sci-fi world as Cinder and has heard the news of the cyborg girl who crashed the prince’s ball, accidentally joining forces with Wolf (yes, like the wolf from the fairytale). She is determined to figure out where her missing grandmother has been.
Meyer does not disappoint with the plot in book two of this series. A lot of it consists of much running, and banter, and the book does not dip significantly in its entirety. There are twists in the second book that should’ve been easily identifiable due to the nature of the fairytale yet surprise the reader once they appear on the page. While Scarlet and Wolf are trying to find the former’s grandmother Cinder and a new character (Carswell Thorne, based on the male counterpart of Rapunzel) are equally adventuring trying to find Cinder’s prince captured by the queen of the Lunar people. The character dynamics in this book are spectacular between Scarlet, Wolf, and especially Cinder and Thorne, plus all four when they meet at the end. Each character speaks differently, and the dialogue is fleshed out enough to the point that the personas feel real and deeply embedded into each character.
The third book is the longest in the series and follows the stories of all four introduced characters, as well as the new Rapunzel-based Cress Darnell: a hacker who meets Thorne under unfortunate circumstances forcing them to trek through the desert together. While this story is less focused on large plot-points, the descriptions are still movie-like, and the dialogue carries nearly the entire story and showcases Meyer’s ability to maximize with minimalistic writing, even if it is clear the book is only a building block to a grand finale.
This grand finale is a loose Snow White retelling titled “Winter” and is the most action packed of all. Meyer strays from her description and dialogue heavy storyline to deliver a fast-paced action adventure plot which keeps getting better. At this point all characters have been fleshed out completely for one to care about their storylines. No scene in this book is devoid of suspense or tension and allows for an incredibly fast paced read regardless of the size or length of the book.
One of the essential pieces of “The Lunar Chronicles” is the fact that it uses archetypes that most readers are fond of and grew up with to create a sense of familiarity in its prose. Mixed with all the futuristic plotlines and comforting tendencies of Meyer’s writing style, the series becomes a thoroughly enjoyable sci-fi series that is not talked about enough.
