Scarlet

Scarlet by Marissa Meyer

I reviewed the first book in the series, Cinder, HERE.

This blog post will contain MANY spoilers about Cinder as there are many leftover things from the book that I wanted to see happen in this book and it just didn't. Fair warning.

An amazon 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." AMAZON LINK OF JUSTICE

So first things first.

Some things I wanted more details about in Scarlet (which failed to happen).

I wanted to know more about the World War that happened to leave the world in kind of shambles; I wanted to see how it affected the people, the landscape, the everything. I didn't get it. Frown.

I wanted a better understanding of what the technology looked like for the world; I didn't get it. Frown.

I wanted to see what the freaking cities looked like that they were traversing through or even more of a description of it; I didn't get it. Frown.

I wanted Cinder to calm down a bit and concentrate on the important things; like surviving long enough to make a difference in the conflict with Lunar. So far so good...

Going into it, I knew Cinder was going to share the narration, I did like how it switched between Cinder, Scarlet, and Kai. Good, good.

I wanted Cinder to calm down and go forth with her life; keeping in mind everything she just learned at the end of the last book (she's actually Princess Selene; rumored to be the only Lunar who is more powerful than  Queen Levana), which she did. PRETTY FREAKING SWEET.



Now let me embark on a summary of sorts so I can get to the bones of the story. I'm going to straight explain what is happening in Cinder's part and then switch to Scarlet's part. I'm cutting myself off at the 30% mark because math.

Cinder had a visit from Dr. Erland who might have upgraded some of her cybernetics and told her to meet him in Africa (which isn't vague at all) and manages to escape from prison with Cadet Thorne. Cadet Thorne insists that he's actually a Captain, but that's about as charming as he gets. Thorne really comes along because he proclaims to have a ship in storage, Cinder is in need of a ship, and she had a slight miscalculation of the cells when she was moved. They make it out of the prison with Cinder starting to learn some of her Lunar abilities. With their prison escape, they have to climb through sewers to reach the ship, deal with an unruly storage facilitator, and manage to get the ship out of Beijing almost at the price of Cinder's life. There are a lot of technology bits that happened in this part that I wasn't too fond of.

Switch to the introduction of Scarlet as a rough girl whose Grandmother has been missing for almost two weeks with a clue of her ID chip having been removed and left in the house. She wears a red hood, lives on a farm with her Grandmother and tries not to have anything to do with her Father. She meets Wolf at a bar which she delivers some of the farm's produce to. There's a newscast about the Lunar who escaped prison (Cinder) and the bar gets into a frenzy about how awful that girl must be, Scarlet defends her, and then as the bar gets rowdy, Wolf physically defends Scarlet. Wolf is portrayed as a mysterious stranger that partakes in street fights, can eat a lot, and seems very unaccustomed to normal bits of life. Like tomatoes.

Scarlet's Father makes an incoherent appearance as he scrambles around the farmhouse looking for anything that the Grandmother might have hid while rambling about a tattoo he saw on his kidnappers arm (one that Wolf seems to have as well). Scarlet discovers he's injured, gets him put together a bit before putting him to bed. She seeks out Wolf at one of his street fights convinced that he's the one who stole her Grandmother and witnesses the ruthless brutality that Wolf is capable of. Wolf and Scarlet escape separately from the fight grounds. Wolf comes by the next morning, and after some hassling of each other, Wolf agrees to help her find her Grandmother. Her Father goes into another savage rampage trying to find something her Grandmother might have hidden and Scarlet kicks him off of the farm after Wolf pulls some sort of tracker/listening device necklace off of me and destroys it.

Now I'm going to take a moment to make some timeline references. This is delving into SPOILER LAND kind of.

The story of Cinder took about two weeks in their world's time to complete. The story of Scarlet took about four days to complete in their world's time.

In the time of Cinder's story, it took Cinder and Kai about two weeks to love each other.

In  the time of Scarlet's story, it took Scarlet and Wolf a day to fall in crush with each other, a second day to realize it was love, a third day for Scarlet to realize that Wolf betrayed her, and then love again when they escape together.

FOUR DAYS TO FALL IN "LOVE". WHAT. WHAT.

I know there millions of moments in stories where they're like, "It was love at first sight", but this was "It was love at first danger" deal. Um, what? I believe Scarlet is 18 in this book. I would think that someone who has managed to survive to 18 would have some more reservations about loving someone. At the end, Scarlet even declares that she'll be Wolf's 'Alpha Female'. REALLY?

Sigh.

I'm not sure if the series is truly worth continuing to read.

I am curious if Thorne is a fairy tale character or reference to it of some sort, but I'm drawing a blank as to who he could be or if I'm just looking for something that isn't there. The same thing with Iko; is she designed to be a Pinocchio reference with how much she wants to be 'alive'.

I don't know. I also don't know if I care.

Happy reading.