Cress by Marissa Meyer – Guest Post & Giveaway!

We here at Fic Fare are huge huge fans of the Lunar Chronicles and Marissa Meyer! (We flail all about her and the books in our podcast posting in the next day or so!!) When we noticed she was having a tour for Cress we jumped at the chance to be on it because we wanted to share our love of this series with all of you!

For our post on the tour, Marissa decided to share something we would probably never ever hear about… are you ready?

10 Things that Changed from Cress’s First Draft

By Marissa Meyer

Although the details vary from book to book, my writing process generally tends to be that I write one very sloppy first draft, read through it and figure out all of the many things that aren’t working, then scrap it almost entirely and start over. This means that by my second or third draft of the book, some things are virtually unrecognizable from my original plans.

Here are 10 things that existed or happened in the first draft of Cress that are very different from what you’ll find in the finished book. But while I may tell you what’s not there anymore… you’ll have to read it to find out what these things changed to.

1. The title: From Crescent to Cress.

“Cress” has always been Cress’s nickname, as it relates to the Rapunzel fairy tale (cress and rapunzel are both types of lettuce, which I’ll explain in more detail in another post during this blog tour). Athough in the final draft, Cress is short for “Crescent Moon,” originally her name was just Crescent, so that was the original working title of the book. Crescent: Book Three of the Lunar Chronicles.

2. The length—and an entire plotline.

My manuscripts always grow between the first and second drafts, and Cress is no exception. In fact—it doubled, from 69,000 words to just over 140,000. This is in part due to more research and world-building, but mostly it’s because, in the first draft, I was solely focused on Cress’s storyline. Most of Cinder’s side of the story (which takes up about 50% of the final book) wasn’t added in until later.

3. Cress was being kept in the satellite as part of an experiment.

In the earliest incarnation of the Lunar Chronicles, the Lunar gift was much more magic-based. Okay, it was magic, complete with spells and incantations and fireballs being thrown from their fingertips. (Much, much different from the bioelectric manipulation it evolved into!) So in the first draft of this books, Cress—a shell without magic powers—was being kept in a satellite, separate from the rest of Lunar society, while Thaumaturge Sybil Mira attempted to teach her to use magic, certain that shells could be great weapons if there was a way to give them the Lunar gift.

4. Cinder and crew first contacted Cress for help with a software problem.

In the first draft, Cinder, Thorne, Wolf, and Scarlet decided to reach out for Cress’s help when their spaceship started having programming issues, as Cinder knew that Cress was a skilled hacker. (Yes, she was a skilled hacker even then—at least one thing stayed the same!) In that version, Cress was able to fix their software problem remotely, which was followed by quite a few chapters of really adorable instant-messaging-type chats between Cress and Thorne. That is not exactly how things go down in the finished book . . .

5. Scarlet and Wolf

They were certainly in the first draft of Cress, but just barely, and the only excitement they saw in the whole book was when Wolf had to participate in a secret street fight to try to earn the crew some black-market spending cash. That scene was cut completely (though stay tuned, it may yet end up as a deleted scene feature one of these days . . .), but Scarlet and Wolf see a lot more excitement in the book now, and a lot more danger.

6. Jacin who?

In the first draft of Cress, the characters eventually met up with Jacin, a doctor living in Africa near where the first outbreak of letumosis occurred. Jacin is still in the book, but he has a different occupation, a different purpose, and a much bigger role—which came as a big surprise to me somewhere around Draft #3.

7. Sex slavery (seriously).

Here I go, getting all edgy and risqué with my first drafts! In the first two drafts of the book, Cress found herself caught up with some no-good types and was eventually sold into—ack!—sex slavery, and there was an entire subplot about Lunar fetishism. I’d even mentioned this plot twist in the synopsis my agent and I had used to sell the books to my publisher, and in hindsight, I’m a little surprised it didn’t raise any red flags for anybody! Needless to say, it eventually occurred to me that this did not fit the story I was trying to write, and I found a solution that made a whole lot more sense.

8. Cress’s uncle, Merlin.

I’d totally forgotten that in the first draft, Cress met her dead mother’s twin brother—Uncle Merlin. Good old crazy Uncle Merlin. He was also a wizard. Because, remember, there was real magic in the books back then. Also, his name was Merlin.

9. Winter’s Cameo.

One of my very favorite scenes from Cress is when we meet Princess Winter (the title heroine from Book 4) for the first time. But this scene didn’t exist until the fourth or fifth draft of the book. Like—I seriously added it in about two weeks before the book went to copyedits.

10. We still didn’t know who the missing Lunar princess was.

Lunar Chronicles fans are aware that the identity of the missing Lunar heir—Princess Selene—was hinted at throughout Book 1: Cinderand revealed by its end. But when I was first writing the books, I’d left the identity unconfirmed, even for myself! So there was a point in this draft when I was honestly curious if Cress was, in fact, the princess. On top of that, at the end of the first draft of Scarlet,Scarlet’s grandmother had given her a cryptic note that she believed would help them figure out the princess’s identity, so a whole lot of Book 3 was originally dedicated to a treasure hunt of sorts as they tried to follow the clues to the missing Lunar heir. Needless to say, that entire subplot is gone.

I hope that gives a little insight into the ongoing growth of this series, and whets your appetite to know what did, in fact, make it into the final version of Cress. Happy reading!

CRESS (Lunar Chronicles #3)

By: Marissa Meyer

Publication Date: February 4, 2014

Rapunzel’s tower is a satellite. She can’t let down her hair—or her guard.

In this third book in the bestselling Lunar Chronicles series, Cinder and Captain Thorne are fugitives on the run, with Scarlet and Wolf in tow. Together, they’re plotting to overthrow Queen Levana and her army.

Their best hope lies with Cress, who has been trapped on a satellite since childhood with only her netscreens as company. All that screen time has made Cress an excellent hacker—unfortunately, she’s just received orders from Levana to track down Cinder and her handsome accomplice.

When a daring rescue goes awry, the group is separated. Cress finally has her freedom, but it comes at a high price. Meanwhile, Queen Levana will let nothing stop her marriage to Emperor Kai. Cress, Scarlet, and Cinder may not have signed up to save the world, but they may be the only ones who can.

ABOUT MARISSA

One of my first spoken words was “story” (right along with “bath” and “cookie”), my favorite toy as an infant was a soft, squishable book, and I’ve wanted to be a writer since I first realized such a job existed.

When I was fourteen my best friend introduced me to anime and fanfiction—over the years I would complete over forty Sailor Moon fanfics under the penname Alicia Blade. Those so inclined can still find my first stories at fanfiction.net. Writing fanfic turned out to be awesome fun and brought me in contact with an amazing group of fanfiction readers and writers. As Alicia Blade, I also had a novelette, “The Phantom of Linkshire Manor,” published in the gothic romance anthology Bound in Skin (CatsCurious Press, 2007).

When I was sixteen I worked at The Old Spaghetti Factory in Tacoma, Washington, affectionately termed “The Spag.” (Random factoid: This is also the restaurant where my parents met some 25 years before.) I attended Pacific Lutheran University where I sorted mail that came to the dorm, carted tables and chairs around campus, and took writing classes, eventually earning a Bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing and Children’s Literature. Knowing I wanted a career in books, I would also go on to receive a Master’s degree in Publishing from Pace University (which you can learn more about here). After graduation, I worked as an editor in Seattle for a while before becoming a freelance typesetter and proofreader.

Then, day of days, someone thought it would be a good idea to give me a book deal, so I became a full-time writer. CINDER is my first novel, though I have an adorable collection of unfinished ones lying around too.

I now live with my husband and our three cats (Calexandria Josephine, Stormus Enormous, and Blackland Rockwell III), who go in and out, in and out, about eight hundred times a day. My favorite non-bookish things include Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, re-watching episodes of Firefly, and playing all manners of dress-up.

–Become a fan of the Lunar Chronicles on Facebook!

–Become a fan of the Lunar Chronicles on Tumblr!

–Pre-Order a copy of Cress to get a free comb! Details here. (US Only)

–See Marissa Meyer on tour!

–Join the Scarlet Readathon!

–Get more fun Lunar Chronicles links and info on the MacTeenBooks blog!

Read the first two books in the Lunar Chronicles Series

OR Because MacMillan is so amazing you could win all three books here!! Win a paperback of Cinder, a paperback of Scarlet and a hardcover of Cress & a Cress Comb by entering below! (US/CAN only – Must be 13 or older to win and winner has 48 hours to respond or a new winner will be chosen.)