I gave this one star because I didn't finish it, but in all reality, it probably AT LEAST deserves two stars. The reason for this is simply because it's NOT a bad book. At all. But it was never for me. Cinder is one of the books that finally made me realize that young adult books were probably not for me. They never really had been, but because I kept DNFing them, it finally made sense to stop trying them with the hopes that something would change. I guess I just wanted to feel included, because everyone on booktube and bookstagram were obsessed with YA, and the Lunar Chronicles were not only one of the most popular series of the time, but were fairytale retellings on top of it.

Cinder is actually pretty creative, I have to say. It's a sci-fi retelling of Cinderella, and I can definitely see why it appeals to people. Unfortunately, a few things made it miss the mark for me. For one, I wasn't as invested in Cinder. And Cinderella had never really been a fairytale I was interested to start with, least of all as a retelling. Much as I love retellings, I'm still pretty picky about them.

On top of that, we all kind of knew where it was going from the start. YA books focus heavily on romantic subplots, and with a Cinderella retelling, that shouldn't have come as any surprise. Unfortunately, I didn't care for that aspect in the least, and the male love interest didn't have me lusting and pining over him the way others might have been.

But the third thing that I realized while reading this book, the thing that really made me set it down to start with, was that I'm just not into Sci-Fi. At the time, I kind of hated anything that had to do with Sci-Fi because none of it appealed to me. Now that I'm a bit older, I recognize there are some things that actually do appeal to me that come from Sci-Fi, but Cinder didn't and doesn't have any of those things that would have made it worthwhile for me to read.

So instead of spending time reading something that just wasn't up my ally, I gave it up. Donated the book. It's not bad. But it wasn't for me. Still, I'd actually recommend this book to younger readers who are interested in fairytale retellings and Sci-Fi. It's a cool concept, and from what I remember, it was actually executed pretty well. I don't remember being disgusted by any toxic tropes, though I could be wrong on that guess. Still, it's not bad.