Camels, Caravans, and Cutting Hair: "Cress" by Marissa Meyer - REVIEW

“I will be the judge of when you are dying, and when that happens, I guarantee you will get a kiss worth waiting for. But right now, you have to get up.” 

- pg. 204, Cress

Marissa Meyer is the author of various novels including The Lunar Chronicles, Heartless, The Renegades Trilogy, Instant Karma, and the graphic novel duology Wires and Nerve. She hosts “The Happy Writer” podcast, lives in Washington with her husband and kids, and published her first book, Cinder, in 2012. Meyer earned a BA in Creative Writing from Pacific Lutheran University and an MA in Publishing from Pace University.¹

Cress is the third installment in The Lunar Chronicles, where it retells the story of “Rapunzel” in a sci-fi dystopian world. Instead of locked in a tower, Cress is locked in a satellite orbiting Earth. When she is rescued by her ‘prince,’ she helps him and his comrades attempt to save the world from an imminent alliance with the enemy. Cress is action-packed and love-filled with battles, relationship tensions, and laugh-out-loud funny moments.

“Pause one second. And be honest… are you having a mental breakdown right now?” 

- pg. 429, Cress

Meyer continues to allocate appropriate amounts of time to the various storylines within the plot, which kept me interested and engrossed. She seamlessly weaves her way between humor, intensity, emotional turmoil, love, cute moments, and happy times from line to line. As mentioned in my review of Scarlet, Meyer uses quotes from the original “Rapunzel” to separate the novel into sections, emphasizing the emotion and action throughout. One element worth noting is that the dystopia of this world is not realistic as a possible future outcome, but it works as a foundation for the plot of the characters.

The range of emotions brought out of me from reading this book is unreal. One second I’m laughing, the next I’m cringing from horror and disgust; then I’m gasping or yelling or kicking my feet or hitting the book. Even though this is my second time reading Cress, there were many moments that still caught me off guard—I completely forgot about them! “Tangled” has always been my favorite movie, so I’m not surprised that Cress is (most likely) my favorite character in the series.

Cress emphasizes love and trials with humor and engaging characters with relationships that make readers like me truly care. It has been a very exciting reread!

Rating: 5/5

No spice. No explicit language.

¹ From Marissa Meyer’s website: About Marissa - Marissa Meyer