REVIEW: Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

Title: Shatter Me (Shatter Me #1)

Author: Tahereh Mafi

Publication Date: November 15^th 2011

Publisher: Harper

Format: Paperback

Pages: 338

Rating: 5/5
Blurb: I have a curse.
I have a gift.

I'm a monster.
I'm more than human.

My touch is lethal.
My touch is power.

I am their weapon.
I will fight back.

No one knows why Juliette's touch is fatal, but The Reestablishment has plans for her. Plans to use her as a weapon. But Juliette has plans of her own. After a lifetime without freedom, she's finally discovering a strength to fight back for the very first time—and to find a future with the one boy she thought she'd lost forever.

Review: When I was given this book for Christmas by my mum way back in 2011, I had never heard of it at all, though with a quick survey of the summary I knew exactly what to expect and so this book was shoved into my bookshelves and left on my TBR list until someone borrowed it and kept it for over six months. During this time, Chami decided to read this book and from that moment I was subject to being told about five times a day as to how amazing this book was and how much I should read it. So before I get on to the proper review, I’m going to give Chami a moment to gloat over how right she was about this book.

I’ve read a few reviews who say they hated Juliette, that she annoyed them *cough* Chami *cough* but I actually didn’t have any massive issues with her, which can be quite rare for me when it comes to protagonists in dystopic novels. I, like Chami, really enjoyed seeing both sides of Juliette- the things she wanted to say but didn’t and the things she did actually say, which was probably my favourite thing about this book. I liked how she wasn’t just a one-dimensional character- she wasn’t entirely good but she wasn’t overwhelming evil either, her depth was very refreshing.

Love triangle wise, the whole time through the novel I couldn’t decide who the hell I wanted Juliette to end up with. Adam or Warner, Warner or Adam? Gah, I still can’t decide which of them I prefer. Can Juliette just end up with both? Or even better, I’ll just take both of them for myself. All this being said, James was possibly my favourite character of the entire book- I won’t tell you who he is or why he’s my favourite because it will spoil things.  

I loved the pacing of the novel, it was fast enough that I ended up reading the first 250 or so pages within the space of about an hour without stopping even once. I found there wasn’t ever really a dull moment in the plot or parts where I wanted things to speed up or end quicker.

I absolutely cannot wait until I’m able to get my hands of the second book, I’m so desperate to see how everything works out for Juliette.

You can buy Shatter Me on The Book Depository (Free shipping worldwide), here

Check out Chami's review here