Book Review: Shatter Me by Tahere Mafi
Since I decided to be random and just myself on LJ, so that I can be active here, I decided to post a few book reviews. I have been reading a lot this year. I have already read 106 books this year. There are a lot of people who have read twice that, but still it's a good number! lol
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.
Review:When I got this book, I couldn't tear the parcel fast enough. I had heard so many good things about this book so I just had to read it as soon as I could.
Let me tell you I wasn't disappointed.
Juliette is a 17-year-old girl who hasn't been touched in 264 days. It also becomes apparent that she has barely spoken to anyone in that time, either. Ever since she was a child there was something different about her. Her mother got sick when she touched her and gradually her parents grew withdrawn and unresponsive to her. They just wanted her to stay out of trouble. Which is hard when your touch can kill. She didn't know it, but a single touch of her hand could reduce anyone to a sobbing pile on the floor.
And it was this way that her life went on. Avoided, unappreciated, almost invisible. Everyone kept their distance from her and Juliette wanting to fit in, to belong to be accepted is a little over a doormat for them on some occasions. She gives up her place in school trips, she gives up her food, but she never receives a "thank you" from the people she helps.
she could grow to get used to it, even though it hurt, till at fourteen she tries to pick up an abused kid on the floor after receiving "discipline" and he dies.
Within the blink of an eye she is apprehended and spends three years being evaluated, examined, tested, experimented on, until she ends up at an asylum.
There she is abandoned in 4 grey walls and a glass "slit" for a window. But the view is atrocious, because the world as she used to know it is gone. Radiation and disease have killed both flora and fauna almost to extinction and The Establishment has taken control ruling by force(through the public's fear and resignation), by guns and violence. They promised things would be better, but they aren't. People are still famished and the world is not getting any safer or healthier.
Then one day, she is given a cellmate. His name is Adam. Initially reserved and indifferent he later on warms up to her and wants to get to know her, but Juliette is too scared, to inexperienced to believe him and indulge him, but indulge him she wants. Especially, since he may be her only chance of escape from her prison, when Waren (the Establishment's leader's son in charge of this sector) becomes infatuated with her and her power and wants to use her for his own purposes.
------
What can I say about this book? It was enthralling. How can you not sympathize with someone who is deprived of human touch, of warmth, of the basic love of her parents?
How can your heart not go out to a young girl who has suffered so much? Not having anyone to talk to? To hug? To cherish? Granted her touch on naked skin is lethal, but if anyone was willing, there would still be ways to show your affection (gloves etc.), but her own parents didn't even bother going into the trouble. That was a tragedy right from the start. And it might be because I'm Greek and we as a people are quite affectionate and touchy-feely (in a good way :P), it might be that I'm a hugger as a person and would be one whatever my ethnicity was, but this feeling of emptiness, of helplessness and unworthiness really touched me.
Juliette was essentially a good person. And even though in any other case (and some incidents described from her past) it might make her come across as a saccharine character, the author avoided that trap and her own goodness is both the cause and the consequence of her tragedy.
I believe people are essentially good, I might be wrong, but I had no hard time believing it in Juliette's case. But despite that, she acts good towards her classmates in order to be liked AND because she feels like it.
It is both genuine and self-serving, selfless and selfish, but it backfires or is unacknowledged every time. Still, introverted though she becomes, she never loses hope. Hope of being free out there, or of being free of her power or her life. I loved how brave she is. Fragile, yet determined, focused, yet fragmented. A really memorable heroine.
And the writing style/description...WOW.
I've read some readers thought the metaphors were a little over the top, even nonsensical, but I didn't. I related and was blown away by each and every one of them. The one with raindrops and people comes to mind and a lot more.
i.e.:I’m wearing dead cotton on my limbs and a blush of roses on my face that's what Juliette thinks when she sees Adam.
Was there ever a more elegant way to express that all this time everything around her was lifeless (thus dead cotton), colorless, the four grey walls, her loneliness , but the instant she saw him she somehow came alive (hence the blushing)?
The strike through didn't bother me, either. It made the whole thing more intense and exciting and it is mostly in the beginning when Juliette's psyche hasn't started getting healed yet.
The only thing that irked me a bit, was the repetition of a word or sentence many many times.
There's only so many times you can say a word in a sentence before it stops having an additional effect in intensity. At some points it was just distracting and ...superfluous if that is the correct world. That repetition wasn't needed to get it more profound, the description was already heart-breaking and souldeep.
And well, I don't think there was any reason to have all numbers represented with actual numbers and not words. Two instead of 2 etc. Not a bad thing, it was just a bit weird. I think it would have the same effect with me and be less weird if there were words for them, like two lips, two eyes etc.
The other characters are also nicely outlined and not one-dimensional. Adam has his own pained story, but he is strong too. He is fierce, devoted, unrelenting, brave. His connection with Juliette is deeper than you can imagine and is a lot older than what you think (it's not exactly insta-love and I love that). Waren comes across as delusional, selfish, quite a hedonist actually, but there are some redeeming qualities in him mostly having to do with the state of his family and the absence of his mother.
Kenji is one of my personal favorites because he is kind of a classic bad boy with a golden heart which becomes more obvious towards the end. I liked his banter and his horniness, it is only understandable if soldiers don't mingle with girls/women. He is really hilarious at some points and though I usually fall for those kind of characters and want them to get the girl in the end, I really can't fault Juliette for picking Adam. It's destiny and perfection and you don't mess with it.
The plot was really well-paced and truly had me on my toes. I wanted to keep reading page after page just to find out what was going to happen next. When Adam and Juliette escape the prison, my heart was racing and I could feel my heartbeat in my ears. There were no blatant plot holes I can think of. On the contrary, everything was explained beautifully, apart from the ending where well as I am an anxious person I'd love to know the explanation for the powers already and everything! XD
And the purple uniform didn't do it for me, it felt a bit too graphic novel for me, but I forgive it because the book was wonderful. :P
In short I cannot wait for the next book and READ THIS BOOK NOW!!
P.S.: To end this review on a funny note, I have to mention something my brother told me once I told him about the book and how Juliette only had like three minutes a day to shower and a bar of soap.
Brother: Seriously? That sucks! Wait, just soap and two minutes? And you say she was imprisoned there for 364 days? With no razor? Gee, imagine her armpits and legs, she must have looked like a monkey! Now, that's seriously attractive!
lol He has a point, though! lol
I don't think Adam or anyone would like me that much after 364 days with no depilation! lol j/k
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.
Review:When I got this book, I couldn't tear the parcel fast enough. I had heard so many good things about this book so I just had to read it as soon as I could.
Let me tell you I wasn't disappointed.
Juliette is a 17-year-old girl who hasn't been touched in 264 days. It also becomes apparent that she has barely spoken to anyone in that time, either. Ever since she was a child there was something different about her. Her mother got sick when she touched her and gradually her parents grew withdrawn and unresponsive to her. They just wanted her to stay out of trouble. Which is hard when your touch can kill. She didn't know it, but a single touch of her hand could reduce anyone to a sobbing pile on the floor.
And it was this way that her life went on. Avoided, unappreciated, almost invisible. Everyone kept their distance from her and Juliette wanting to fit in, to belong to be accepted is a little over a doormat for them on some occasions. She gives up her place in school trips, she gives up her food, but she never receives a "thank you" from the people she helps.
she could grow to get used to it, even though it hurt, till at fourteen she tries to pick up an abused kid on the floor after receiving "discipline" and he dies.
Within the blink of an eye she is apprehended and spends three years being evaluated, examined, tested, experimented on, until she ends up at an asylum.
There she is abandoned in 4 grey walls and a glass "slit" for a window. But the view is atrocious, because the world as she used to know it is gone. Radiation and disease have killed both flora and fauna almost to extinction and The Establishment has taken control ruling by force(through the public's fear and resignation), by guns and violence. They promised things would be better, but they aren't. People are still famished and the world is not getting any safer or healthier.
Then one day, she is given a cellmate. His name is Adam. Initially reserved and indifferent he later on warms up to her and wants to get to know her, but Juliette is too scared, to inexperienced to believe him and indulge him, but indulge him she wants. Especially, since he may be her only chance of escape from her prison, when Waren (the Establishment's leader's son in charge of this sector) becomes infatuated with her and her power and wants to use her for his own purposes.
------
What can I say about this book? It was enthralling. How can you not sympathize with someone who is deprived of human touch, of warmth, of the basic love of her parents?
How can your heart not go out to a young girl who has suffered so much? Not having anyone to talk to? To hug? To cherish? Granted her touch on naked skin is lethal, but if anyone was willing, there would still be ways to show your affection (gloves etc.), but her own parents didn't even bother going into the trouble. That was a tragedy right from the start. And it might be because I'm Greek and we as a people are quite affectionate and touchy-feely (in a good way :P), it might be that I'm a hugger as a person and would be one whatever my ethnicity was, but this feeling of emptiness, of helplessness and unworthiness really touched me.
Juliette was essentially a good person. And even though in any other case (and some incidents described from her past) it might make her come across as a saccharine character, the author avoided that trap and her own goodness is both the cause and the consequence of her tragedy.
I believe people are essentially good, I might be wrong, but I had no hard time believing it in Juliette's case. But despite that, she acts good towards her classmates in order to be liked AND because she feels like it.
It is both genuine and self-serving, selfless and selfish, but it backfires or is unacknowledged every time. Still, introverted though she becomes, she never loses hope. Hope of being free out there, or of being free of her power or her life. I loved how brave she is. Fragile, yet determined, focused, yet fragmented. A really memorable heroine.
And the writing style/description...WOW.
I've read some readers thought the metaphors were a little over the top, even nonsensical, but I didn't. I related and was blown away by each and every one of them. The one with raindrops and people comes to mind and a lot more.
i.e.:I’m wearing dead cotton on my limbs and a blush of roses on my face that's what Juliette thinks when she sees Adam.
Was there ever a more elegant way to express that all this time everything around her was lifeless (thus dead cotton), colorless, the four grey walls, her loneliness , but the instant she saw him she somehow came alive (hence the blushing)?
The strike through didn't bother me, either. It made the whole thing more intense and exciting and it is mostly in the beginning when Juliette's psyche hasn't started getting healed yet.
The only thing that irked me a bit, was the repetition of a word or sentence many many times.
There's only so many times you can say a word in a sentence before it stops having an additional effect in intensity. At some points it was just distracting and ...superfluous if that is the correct world. That repetition wasn't needed to get it more profound, the description was already heart-breaking and souldeep.
And well, I don't think there was any reason to have all numbers represented with actual numbers and not words. Two instead of 2 etc. Not a bad thing, it was just a bit weird. I think it would have the same effect with me and be less weird if there were words for them, like two lips, two eyes etc.
The other characters are also nicely outlined and not one-dimensional. Adam has his own pained story, but he is strong too. He is fierce, devoted, unrelenting, brave. His connection with Juliette is deeper than you can imagine and is a lot older than what you think (it's not exactly insta-love and I love that). Waren comes across as delusional, selfish, quite a hedonist actually, but there are some redeeming qualities in him mostly having to do with the state of his family and the absence of his mother.
Kenji is one of my personal favorites because he is kind of a classic bad boy with a golden heart which becomes more obvious towards the end. I liked his banter and his horniness, it is only understandable if soldiers don't mingle with girls/women. He is really hilarious at some points and though I usually fall for those kind of characters and want them to get the girl in the end, I really can't fault Juliette for picking Adam. It's destiny and perfection and you don't mess with it.
The plot was really well-paced and truly had me on my toes. I wanted to keep reading page after page just to find out what was going to happen next. When Adam and Juliette escape the prison, my heart was racing and I could feel my heartbeat in my ears. There were no blatant plot holes I can think of. On the contrary, everything was explained beautifully, apart from the ending where well as I am an anxious person I'd love to know the explanation for the powers already and everything! XD
And the purple uniform didn't do it for me, it felt a bit too graphic novel for me, but I forgive it because the book was wonderful. :P
In short I cannot wait for the next book and READ THIS BOOK NOW!!
P.S.: To end this review on a funny note, I have to mention something my brother told me once I told him about the book and how Juliette only had like three minutes a day to shower and a bar of soap.
Brother: Seriously? That sucks! Wait, just soap and two minutes? And you say she was imprisoned there for 364 days? With no razor? Gee, imagine her armpits and legs, she must have looked like a monkey! Now, that's seriously attractive!
lol He has a point, though! lol
I don't think Adam or anyone would like me that much after 364 days with no depilation! lol j/k