Tuesday, December 17, 2013

Review: Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi


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Title: Shatter Me
Author: Tahereh Mafi
Series: Shatter Me #1
Publisher: Harper
Publication date: November 11, 2011
Format: Hardcover purchased
Pages: 338
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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


My Thoughts: It has actually taken me a while to write this review. If you have read this book you know -  will know what I am talking about. Taherah Mafi’s writing style is unlike another modern book I have ever read before. It reminds me of a poetry, which I have never been a huge fan of, but my problem with poetry is simple. I want to know more. I don’t want it to let me guess. I have no problem reading Shakespeare’s plays or Jeffery Chaucer because their poetry is a story. It has a beginning, a middle, and an end. That’s how Shatter Me is written. It doesn’t follow any “normal” writing pattern yet, it makes perfect sense.
There are so many things to love about this story. In the words of the Epic Reads girls, it has a ton of feels. The entire book is about Juliette’s feelings for a world that has never accepted her because she is feared. Yet she doesn’t let this turn her into a negative or vengeful person, she just keeps trying to be good and she keeps seeing the beauty in a devastated world full of fearful people. The two men (Adam and Warner) in the book are two sides of the same coin leaving it up to Juliette to choose who she wants to be.  
This is a powerful story. I am not usually one to quote every book I read but I could have quoted this entire book. It’s so well written and such a wonderful story. I always wonder about a book that has a lot of hype behind it but the hype for this book is well deserved!
I love love LOVED this story and I cannot wait to read the rest of this series! 
Quotables: 
“They locked me up with a boy. A boy.
Dear God.
They’re trying to kill me.
They’ve done this on purpose.”

“Hate looks just like everybody else until it smiles.”

“He’s wrong he’s so wrong he’s more wrong than an upside-down rainbow”

“All I ever wanted was to reach out and touch another human being not just with my hands but with my heart.” 

“I'm oxygen and he's dying to breathe.”

“I've been screaming for years and no one has ever heard me.”

“His eyes are two buckets of rainwater: deep, fresh, clear. Hurt.”

“One word, two lips, three four five fingers form a fist.
One corner, two parents, three four five reasons to hide.
One child, two eyes, three four seventeen years of fear.
A broken broomstick, a pair of wile faces, angry whispers, locks on my door."


“Truth is a jealous, vicious mistress that never, ever sleeps.” 


“My words wear no parachutes as they fall out of my mouth”


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Tahereh Mafi is a girl. She’s 23. She was born the youngest child with four older brothers in a small city somewhere in Connecticut, and currently resides in Orange County, California. She graduated from a tiny liberal arts college two miles from the shores of Laguna Beach, has varying levels of competency in eight different languages, and spent a semester abroad in Barcelona, Spain, where she had the opportunity to study Spanish literature in its native form. 

Mafi has traveled all over the world, lived on both sides of the United States, and even spent some years writing really bad poetry. When unable to find a book, she can be found reading candy wrappers, coupons, and old receipts.

Shatter Me is her first novel.




Be Tahereh's Bestie




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