"Shatter Me" | Book Review

"Shatter Me" Book Cover

Juliette's touch is fatal. The last time she touched someone was 264 days ago, when she accidentally murdered an innocent. The Reestablishment has locked her up and she's given up hope of living a normal life. In a cruel twist of fate, she's released and given a choice: use her curse as a weapon or rebel against the highest form of government she knows.

Tahereh Mafi is so good at building suspense. One moment, things are normal and the next, your heart's racing and you're almost on the edge of your seat from all the drama and action happening on the pages. Several scenes in Shatter Me are action-packed and thrilling!

As a protagonist, Juliette is very interesting to me. Her narrative voice is often poetic in a way, and I really enjoyed reading her thoughts and impressions on what is going on around her, for the most part. I say it that way because there were also many times where she was heavily doubting her self-worth and I honestly wanted to shake her and tell her something to the effect of, "you're worth more than this, don't be so hard on yourself!!"

The villain, Warner, is great because he's incredibly terrifying and creepy. Warner is obsessed with Juliette and wants her to help he and The Reestablishment fulfill their agenda - or more accurately, he wants her to want to. Yeah.

This is very much a romance novel, in my opinion. I think the focus for this novel, the first in a series, was the romantic relationship. The dystopian setting was discussed throughout the story, but I think more action will happen in the next novel, Unravel Me. I have conflicting feelings about the love story: on one hand, I really like Juliette and Adam together and I think they're well-suited to each other so far; on the other hand, it's a bit frustrating that she falls in love with the first guy she can touch without consequence.

A few pages into this book, I wasn't sure I was going to enjoy it because of all the metaphors and generally flowery writing, but I was sucked into the story and didn't want to put it down. This is a great tale of the quintessential lovers in a dangerous time.

What dystopian YA novel or series do you recommend?