Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Cinder, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Bravery and Sacrifice
Power, Greed, and Evil
Stereotypes and Discrimination
Secrecy and Manipulation
Resourcefulness, Kindness, and Perseverance
Summary
Analysis
Cinder shocked to learn that she’s Queen Levana’s niece, but she knows that Dr. Erland is telling the truth. Dr. Erland tells her that she’s the only one who can dethrone Queen Levana. He’s been searching for her for many years, knowing that she was a cyborg teenager because her body was badly damaged in the fire that Levana set. Cinder suddenly realizes that Dr. Erland set up the cyborg draft to try and find her—she’s furious that he was willing to sacrifice those people’s lives to do so.
Cinder asks if Queen Levana knows who she is, and Dr. Erland says that Levana likely does, but she wants to keep Cinder’s identity hidden. Dr. Erland says that Cinder needs to escape to Africa so that he can help her dethrone Levana. Cinder starts to protest that she can’t be a queen, but he assures her that she can do it. After Dr. Erland leaves, Cinder searches for all the information she can find about Princess Selene via her brain interface and feels as if she has no idea who she is anymore. But then she thinks back to the image of Kai in the market, and she knows that she can’t give up yet.
Cinder feels a strange electricity course through her as she realizes that she is finally in control of her Lunar gift. She takes the knife out of her hand compartment and removes her ID chip from her wrist. She knows the whole world would be searching for her—for Cinder. But they’ll be looking for a ghost.
The book’s final pages leave Cinder’s story on an ambiguous note: she is leaving behind her identity as Cinder and attaining the power of Lunar glamour. But thus far, the book has suggested that unlike Levana, Cinder will use these powers not to take advantage of others, but to support them. And she will do so not by hiding who she is, but by embracing her true identity as Princess Selene.
Themes
