Review: Winter (Lunar Chronicles #4) by Marissa Meyer

Published: November 10, 2015 by Feiwel and Friends
Genre: YA, Science Fiction, Dystopia
Format: ebook
Source: Purchased

Goodreads Summary

Princess Winter is admired by the Lunar people for her grace and kindness, and despite the scars that mar her face, her beauty is said to be even more breathtaking than that of her stepmother, Queen Levana.

Winter despises her stepmother, and knows Levana won’t approve of her feelings for her childhood friend—the handsome palace guard, Jacin. But Winter isn’t as weak as Levana believes her to be and she’s been undermining her stepmother’s wishes for years. Together with the cyborg mechanic, Cinder, and her allies, Winter might even have the power to launch a revolution and win a war that’s been raging for far too long.

Can Cinder, Scarlet, Cress, and Winter defeat Levana and find their happily ever afters?

As she was forced into the elevator, it occurred to Cinder that, for the first time since this had all begun, she was alone.

Aces

This was such a fantastic way to end this series! I have enjoyed each book more and more as the series progressed into this finale. Winter introduces us to the new Princess Winter (also in Fairest if you've read that one) and brings back Cinder, Kai, Scarlet, Wolf, Cress, Thorne, Iko and Jacin. I'm very drawn to character driven books, and Meyer has a way of making every one of her characters have such different personalities, voices, and reasons for being there. I am very attached to these characters. Winter was a great addition to an already stunning cast. She's got this lovable personality and truly cares about others while also being a tad crazy from not using her Lunar gift. It makes you want to pick her up and hug her while simultaneously laughing out loud at her random outbursts. While all the characters are here and each of them has a great deal of time dedicated to them, I love how they kept being split up and separated. It made for some pretty fun pairings as they were split based on who had what job to do. My two favorite pairings of characters were Thorne and Kai who had some wonderful banter and Scarlet and Winter. Scarlet is the brash, no-nonsense girl with a soft spot for crazy people (everyone called her Grandma crazy).

The action was there from the start. I was never bored once. I was on the edge of my seat wondering who was about to get killed or how they were going to get out of whatever new sticky situation they'd gotten themselves into. One second it would look like everything was going smoothly, and the next was like watching when you drop a Cheeto into an ant hill with everyone scattering and just trying to make it work.

Meyer had a ton of ways to end this between killing different characters and letting some live, etc. Also they each had different decisions to make about their future if they made it out alive. I know not every reader will agree with how everything is wrapped up, but it was very satisfying to me.

Every Princess Needs Her Prince

Since this series was divided up into introducing new characters in their own environment and then throwing them all together to fulfill a mission, we got a bunch of people who had crushes on people they were raised with, or meeting new gorgeous strangers for the first time. Needless to say, there was a lot of attraction running throughout. I thought the couples were spot on. I liked how some were deep and committed and how some were still shallow and feeling things out.

Oh Stars!

I loved it. This was such a great series, and Winter was an excellent way for it to end. There is a ton happening here, so much changing from start to finish. The characters are so easy to become attached to and I thought it was great that Winter gave us so much time with each and every one of them. I love it.

Excerpts

"What did you bring me today?" Scarlet asked. "Delusional mutterings with a side of crazy? Or is this one of your good days?" 
The princess grinned and sat down in front of Scarlet's cage, uncaring that the path of tumbled black rock and ground covers would soil her dress. "This is one of my best days," she said, setting the basket on her lap, "for I have brought you a treat, with a side of news."

"Scarlet's the priority. The only priority." Cress considered mentioning that overthrowing Levana and crowning Cinder as queen were decent-sized priorities too, but she dared not.

"Um, hi, I'm Carswell Thorne, a convicted criminal in your country. Have we met?"
Kai rolled his eyes. "I'm saying maybe you should stop putting so much energy into lamenting the fact that Cress was wrong about you, and start putting your energy into proving her right, instead."
"I appreciate the confidence, Your Imperial Psychologist, but we're way beyond that. Cress is over me and...it's for the best."