timeripple | this one's especially lush

I’m finally starting to do things I should have done three months ago (namely, apartment-hunt, think about whether I need to get a car, make plans. Yunno, the small things). In celebration, it is time for a book post! As previously mentioned, my Christmas present to myself was a stack of galleys purloined (with permission) from my former place of employment.

Without further ado!
Scarlet (The Lunar Chronicles, Book 2) by Marissa Meyer (Feb 2013)
I’m going to be lazy and tweak my Goodreads review. Look, every time I sit down to write my browser crashes (thanks for not letting me retrieve my draft, LJ), or somebody demands Family Time with Jeeves & Wooster.

Scarlet's grandma has been kidnapped by sinister forces and our heroine is not having with that. Off to the rescue, Wolf in tow! Halfway across the world, Cinder is on the run after confronting the creepy mind-controlling Lunar Queen at the ball in Book 1. Time to engineer a prisonbreak (literally) and commandeer a bewildered but stylish American and his spaceship. Shenanigans, chaos, and gunfights ensue!

Scarlet ups the game in fine style from where Cinder left off. To be perfectly honest, I felt the tiniest bit let down by Cinder--loved the premise and the characters (cyborg Cinderella, there is nothing that is not awesome about that), but was underwhelmed by the prose and pacing and wished it had committed to its futuristic Asian setting a bit more thoroughly. (I did appreciate the family-name-first details and use of honorifics, though.)

I've warmed up to the series with Scarlet. Much, much better pacing, especially toward the end. The prose is still a bit of a weak point, in my opinion, though it’s generally inoffensive and does an adequate job of serving the story. (It should be noted that I am notoriously hard on prose.) Meyer's strengths continue to be her premise--the sci-fi world with its fairy-tale underpinning keeps getting better--and, more importantly, her characters. Cinder continues to be a wonderful combination of skilled mechanic, cyborg outsider, and vulnerable, determined teenage girl. (Somebody introduce her to Fever Crumb. Those two should be BFF!) Captain Thorne provides some welcome comic relief (that was his favorite leather jacket, you do not understand). Scarlet and Wolf are a lot of fun and bring the badassery in satisfactory fashion. (The biggest badass of all: Grandma.) Iko, of course, is a treasure of an android-turned-space-ship, and Kai is adorable as the damsel--sorry, Emperor--in distress. Somebody please rescue him! I’d do it myself, but, well, there are obvious problems with that.

I’d give it to people who liked: Fever Crumb (where’s the teen engineer heroine BFF crossover fanfic?), Sisters Red, Steampunk!, Young Miles.

I have commandeered my dad’s car (and also my dad) for a trip to hunt wild apartments in Berkeley tomorrow. Wish me luck!