Bookworms: Scarlet (2013) by Marissa Meyer

Scarlet (The Lunar Chronicles #2) by Marissa Meyer. Feiwel & Friends (Macmillan Imprint) 2013. 464 pgs (hardcover). Young adult, fiction, sci-fi. 

Book Summary: 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.

Like Marissa Meyer’s Cinder, Scarlet is set in a future world where the people are not always as they appear. And like the first book of the series, the second combines a classic fairytale with science fiction brilliantly. The story of Red Riding Hood is there, but only vaguely. Scarlet has bright red hair and always wears a red hoodie. Every time someone asks her name, they inevitably ask “Like your hair?” and Scarlet’s various reactions to this question are hilarious.

The writing is superb and enjoyable. It’s a young adult novel, but that doesn’t mean it’s unsophisticated or juvenile. There are complicated plot lines and I often found myself wondering how Cinder and Scarlet would meet up, because it’s clear from the beginning that their journeys are fundamentally intertwined.

And once you find out how their stories are so interconnected, you will probably be as surprised as I was. Marissa Meyer pulls out twists and turns that I never saw coming.

If you’d like to listen to a teaser of the first chapter, you can listen to it here. You can also watch the trailer for the book, if you’d like. Overall I really enjoyed this retelling of Red Riding Hood and I think you will too.