Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi Book Review
Shatter Me
Tahereh Mafi
Publisher: Harper Collins
Release Date: November 15, 2011
Pages: 352
Rating: 4.5 stars
Juliette hasn’t touched anyone in exactly 264 days.
The last time she did, it was an accident, but The Reestablishment locked her up for murder. No one knows why Juliette’s touch is fatal. As long as she doesn’t hurt anyone else, no one really cares. The world is too busy crumbling to pieces to pay attention to a 17-year-old girl. Diseases are destroying the population, food is hard to find, birds don’t fly anymore, and the clouds are the wrong color.
The Reestablishment said their way was the only way to fix things, so they threw Juliette in a cell. Now so many people are dead that the survivors are whispering war– and The Reestablishment has changed its mind. Maybe Juliette is more than a tortured soul stuffed into a poisonous body. Maybe she’s exactly what they need right now.
Juliette has to make a choice: Be a weapon. Or be a warrior.
Everyone has been singing praises for Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi for months now, but I shied away because I find that dystopians generally fall flat for me. This was not the case at all with Shatter Me, as it was one heck of a read that I didn’t want to put down!
Tahereh Mafi throws readers straight into her world. She doesn’t bother with the tedious world building that I feel like so many dystopians do, which I absolutely loved. The set up with The Reestablishment was just brilliant. Shatter Me is a super fast paced read and has a story that is just intoxicating. My one complaint would be that the sentence structure in the first chunk of the book was very distracting. There was a lot of short, choppy sentences that I felt took away from the plot.
Sparks just fly off the page with the chemistry between Juliette and Adam. I loved the two of them, and cannot wait to see more of them in Unravel Me. Juliette was a fabulous main character – I loved the strength she had. Adam was such a sensitive, sweet, all around awesome kind of guy. Warner was such an interesting villain – I wanted to hate him, but I couldn’t completely. He was such an expertly written character.
Tahereh Mafi builds the story until the very last moment. Shatter Me ends on a high note of intrigue and a bit of mystery. The last chapters unravel a lot of questions that I cannot wait to hear the answers to.
Shatter Me is one awesome debut! There was a wicked awesome plot, a great main character, and one hot love interest. Put that all together and you have a book that you will be sad to miss.
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8 Responses to: Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi Book Review
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On 5/5/2012
Dea S. said:
This is one of the most swoon-worthy dystopian books I’ve ever read. I can’t wait for Unravel Me! I missed Juliette and Adam, and especially Warner. :))
Dea S. recently posted..Waiting on Wednesday: Burn for Burn and Gravity
On 5/5/2012
Elodie @ Once Upon a Quote said:
OMG this book sounds amazing !! I can’t wait to meet Julieet, Adam and Warner !! Great review Erica !!
Elodie @ Once Upon a Quote recently posted..Review : Pure by Jennifer L. Armentrout :
On 5/5/2012
Bookworm1858 said:
Warner was probably my favorite character-he just popped off the page! This surprised me as I usually root for the heros and hate the villain but Warner was too charismatic to ignore.
Bookworm1858 recently posted..The Summer My Life Began
On 5/5/2012
DannyBookworm said:
OoOOo I’m sooo happy you loved it so much!! Seriously, just like you I didn’t read it for so long.. I scared it would be just “another” dystopian but.. it wasn’t. What I found most beautiful was the writ in, it totally captured me and stired my emotions.. And, you should listen to the audiobook, maybe for Unravel Me, because it was freaking brilliant. The narrator did an incredible job delivering the emotions …. *sigh* so awesome!
DannyBookworm recently posted..Review: Angel Eyes by Shannon Dittemore
On 5/5/2012
Nicole said:
I’ve been putting off reading this one, too, but I’m glad you liked it! Maybe I’ll bump it up higher on my list…
Nicole recently posted..Timeless
On 5/6/2012
Jasmine Rose said:
I’m so glad to hear you didn’t completely hate Warner. I’m a total Warner fangirl so it’s always nice to hear even a little non-hate from someone else ;]
Jasmine Rose recently posted..Unraveling Isobel by Eileen Cook {Review}
On 5/6/2012
Jennifer Allen said:
I really enjoyed Shatter Me, but I’m a huge dystopia fan soo… That might be part of the reason. Then again, it was one of the first books I read when just getting back into reading, and I didn’t even know what dystopia meant. It really was a great read. I kinda liked the choppy sentences though, I felt more like I was following Juliette’s train of thought. Great review!
Jennifer Allen recently posted..Review: Eldest by Christopher Paolini
On 5/7/2012
Carol said:
very great story and great climax. I love the execution of the story. love it!