Review: Cress by Marissa Meyer

 Title: Cress

Author: Marissa Meyer

Publisher: Feiwel and Friends, imprint of Macmillan

Date Published: 2014

ISBN: 978-0-312-64297-6

In the third instalment of The Lunar Chronicles series, we meet Cresent Moon, aka Cress, a lunar girl who’s been held captive in a satellite orbiting Earth for seven years and has been forced to work as a hacker and spy for the Lunar queen. Her loyalties shift after years of captivity and she establishes contact with the fugitives Cinder, Scarlet, Thorne, and Wolf. The group is split during a rescue mission and they must work to reunite in order to rescue the Commonwealth prince, Kai, from his deadly marriage to Queen Levana.

What an exciting book this was! It’s action packed from start to finish and holy moly, why must I wait so long for the final book, Winter, to come out? I don’t know how I’ll stand the anticipation! I was so tense reading each chapter, hoping for the best outcome. I literally was on the edge of my seat sometimes. The threat that the characters face is very realistically portrayed and the reader is carried along as Cress and co. evade capture.

Meyer does a brilliant job of keeping her female protagonists so independent from one another. Cress’ story is tragic having been separated and isolated at such a young age because she is a shell. Still, she is brave, intelligent, resourceful, and willing to fight for what is right, even if she is a little odd. The budding romance between her and Thorne is endearing, especially as we get to know Thorne more as he experiences a period of great character development. Cress proves herself to be mature, open, and accepting while her connection with Thorne strengthens. Her judgement of him based on the person he truly is, and not the persona she built up in her head, creates a pure and truthful relationship. Each character possesses a strong and distinct personality. I admire Meyer’s ability to make so many unique and independent characters. Each is bold and active and in their own way. I would have liked to see more of Scarlet. She has a strong presence in the book, despite her absence and Meyer does give us a little window into her story, but I think it would have been beneficial to give the reader a little more than a taste of Scarlet’s plot line.

My main frustration in the book is with Wolf. Upon separation from Scarlet, he becomes vacant and despondent, to the point where he cannot act without Cinder’s control. He is the most useless (But don’t get me wrong. He’s not totally useless. Maybe I should say he’s the least involved.) member of the team, which is a HUGE change from the Wolf that we are introduced to in book two. I found this quite inconsistent. I tried to be understanding that he is in a tough situation that anyone might struggle with, but I hoped that he would become determined and driven to remedy his bleak situation. Alas, this is not the case. Even when he does make a greater effort to assist the team, he is reluctant. I was a bit annoyed by the end of the book, but I expect we’ll see a significant turnaround with him in the concluding book.

I’m in love with this series, so if you haven’t read it, I’d strongly recommend you check it out. I’d love to hear what you think!

Check out on Goodreads:
Cress