Renegades, by Marissa Meyer

Ms Meyer is the author of the very successful Lunar Chronicles series, her marvellous ‘adaptation’ of our most beloved fairy tales (see review below); this time she tackles SuperHeroes with the same gusto and flair – reading this was like racing through an exciting, fabulous comic without the illustrations – and with Ms Meyer’s writing talent, who needs pictures?

In a future riven by war and anarchy, a group of Super Prodigies restores order where there was chaos, justice and laws to combat criminality, and peace to a fractured world society. They call themselves the Renegades; each have a particular power of their own and they have used these gifts to triumph over the Anarchists, groups of criminal gangs who reduced the country’s population to poverty and starvation. As the Renegades’ power and success grew, so did a mantra: ‘If you need them, call the Renegades: they will come’.

But that is not always true, as six year-old Nova Artino discovers when hitmen from the Roaches gang murder her parents and baby sister because her father refuses to make weapons for them anymore. She has called for the Renegades but no-one came except her Uncle Alec – too late to save her family but in time to save her and kill the assassin. Nova’s childhood ends that night, but her Uncle keeps her safe; he is her island in a sea of sadness, her protector even though he is known as Ace Anarchy, leader of the Anarchists and sworn enemy of the Renegades. (Still with me? Pay attention, it’s worth it!)

During the decade that follows, Nova meets other Anarchists, all prodigies as she is, all with a particular super talent: the Detonator can make bombs from blue light issuing from her fingertips; Queen Bee has complete control of bees, hornets and wasps, guaranteeing some very nasty stings, and no-one would ever want to meet Phobia, ghostly instigator of your worst nightmares. They have all sworn to destroy the Renegades, especially since the defeat and loss of their leader, Ace in the last great battle that the Renegades won. But how?

Until the plan to infiltrate the Renegades’ echelons takes shape: Nova can enter the Renegade Trials which are held every year for Prodigies; if she is successful she can undermine the organisation from within, become a Super Spy for the Anarchists and provide enough information to mount successful assassination attacks on Captain Chromium and the Dread Warden, the Renegade leaders: ah, revenge will be SO sweet – until her successful integration into the Renegades reveals that not all of them are villains. She finds the double game she is playing dangerous indeed, especially when team leader Adrian starts to show his feelings.

The action is non-stop and there are even some curly moral questions concerning the nature of good and evil, and what really makes someone heroic. Like all Ms Meyer’s stories, ‘Renegades’ is a page-turner extraordinaire; the story ends on a cliffhanger, and the concluding volume will be published at the end of this year. Can’t come soon enough!

FIVE STARS

Cinder, by Marissa Meyer

Our Children’s librarian recommended this book to me and as she’s seldom wrong in her reading choices, I’m happy to give this the ravingest (ravingest??) endorsement possible: WHAT A STORY!

The tale of Cinderella – yep, Cinderella, her nasty stepmum and the two stepsisters – is transferred hundreds of years into the future. Cinderella is now Cinder, living in New Beijing with a family who are, to say the least, most reluctant guardians. She is a mechanic (truly!) and a Cyborg, to her shame, having been fitted out with a steel hand, leg and inbuilt computer screen after a terrible childhood accident. Cyborgs are the future’s Untouchables, considered fit only to perform the most menial and degrading of tasks, but Cinder is such a good mechanic that a Royal prince visits her to have his tutor android repaired, and after that visit she and the reader are lost: she to alien romantic impulses (she is not programmed for this!) and a reluctant involvement in a life and death experiment - and the reader to being nailed to one spot until they have reached the last page.

To add insult to injury, the hapless reader finds that after a thrilling journey at a breakneck pace through more clever plot twists than a pretzel, there are three more books to come – and they haven’t been written yet! To say I feel cheated is an understatement and the withdrawal symptoms are dire, but I also say with complete confidence that ‘Cinder’ will be the next big Blockbuster book/movie series: you read it here first. 

FIVE STARS

Scarlet, by Marissa Meyer

FINALLY! The sequel to Cinder - this time a completely different take on Little Red Riding Hood, and not before time, I say.

Ms Meyer’s sequel to ‘Cinder’, her fabulous, futuristic version of ‘Cinderella’ was so good that this reader found it a real chore to have to wait for Book two – and I’m grinding my teeth to think that Book three won’t be released until next year: couldn’t Ms Meyer speed things up a bit?

Anyway:

Cinder is in prison, having been captured at the the Prince’s ball – instead of leaving a slipper behind, she leaves her Cyborg foot! How’s that for a variation on the old tale? A? A? Sadly, the loss of her foot means that she was an easy catch and is now disabled in her cell – until a secret visit from professor Erland, a research scientist: he provides her with a new state-of-the-art hand and a top-of-the-range foot, enabling her to engineer (she’s a mechanic, remember) a daring escape from jail. And guess who he is? Yep, Ms Meyer’s version of Cinderella’s fairy Godmother.

She also takes with her another prisoner, Thorne, because he has a stolen spaceship hidden in a warehouse, and on their travels they link up with Scarlet Benoit, who has been looking for her beloved grandmother, kidnapped by a gang of wolves. Scarlet wears a red hoody, has a nasty temper and a reluctant attraction to a street fighter called – Wolf. Now. Who do you think she could be? And guess what happens to poor old Grandma imprisoned by the wolf gang in the bowels of the Paris Opera House, derelict and in ruins since the Fourth World War? (the Opera House, not Grandma!) Nothing good, that’s for sure.

As before, Ms Meyer has her readers in an iron grip and doesn’t relinquish them until the very last page: once again, the reader is screaming ‘but what happens NEXT! And once again, we’ll just have to wait and see. I’m sure all this suspense is hell on the digestion, but I’ll just have to tough it out. This is a great series.

FIVE STARS