When we're first introduced to Juliette she has been sitting in solitary confinement for 264 days after killing someone by merely touching them. The ruling power called The Reestablishment decided it was best to lock her up for the rest of her life, until one day the door to her cell opens and a new cell mate strolls in and changes her life forever.

I was introduced to this book during my first few days of using Twitter after following book blogs and authors, it eventually led to me following @TaherehMafi, and I decided to look up the book she mentioned in her twitter description (see social networking really does work!). The premise was intriguing and the next time I was at the bookstore I found it on the shelf and decided to flip through it. What really caught my eye was the unique strike through sentences littered throughout the book, so I figured why not and bought it.

Also the cover was shiny- I'm easily distracted and attracted to shiny objects. Really though the glittering burst surrounding the model on the cover was really effective in conveying the tag line "My Touch Is Power.", it feels like a wave of power moving outward.

Juliette has been isolated from others since her childhood, with constant ridicule and no physical contact, and then eventually prison. It's no wonder that solitary confinement would make someone a little batty, really it's to be expected to come out with some imbalance. Also, when you're forced to look at the same 4 walls every day, you get to know them extremely well- in explicit detail and Juliette had a knack for details and expressing them in listed numbers. This gave a very strict structured feel to the whole world when she was describing things, which is pretty effective considering she spends most of her time in military controlled compounds. In general this whole experience has made her extremely distrustful and introverted.

The story reads like a journal, where she is recounting the events leading up to and including the present, and adding little bits of internal dialogue that at the moment she wanted to say but didn't- which to the reader we see it as the stricken out lines. Some people may find these distracting, but I actually enjoyed them, they slowed down my reading a bit. I really didn't mind though, I took the time to savour these little moments that let us peek into the character's state of mind.

The character of Juliette is a complex and multifaceted one, with each side conflicting with the other. She's very wary of others (with good reason), but she wants to help people if she can. She craves to touch others (especially when you're a hormone fuelled teenager), but is constantly reminded that her touch can kill. This causes moments of self loathing and then moments of defiance against her captor. It was really interesting to be able to explore the many parts of her character, but sometimes it was a bit difficult to follow, I'd stop and think wait what? Is this the same person? I was really glad that eventually we start seeing a more unified and strong Juliette, who is much more coherent - I look forward to how much more she might grow in the subsequent books.

Warner, Juliette's captor and the commander of a particular slice of Reestablishment heaven plays an over the top obsessed psycho who will do anything to have Juliette as a weapon….and for other more unsavoury purposes… Really his character is just that super creepy guy that wants to show the world how awesome he is by any super sadistic means necessary, honestly, I was disturbed by him - well played Tahereh…well played.

Adam, oh Adam, he reminds me of Clark Kent (the Smallville version), the self sacrificing saviour, driven by the downstairs brain to "save the girl!". Also, insert obligatory muscular body here. Need I say more?

The supporting characters, tended to steal the show though. Where with Juliette, Warner and Adam we get some pretty serious dialogue, the character Kenji provided the much needed comedic relief to the serious situations. His banter back and forth with everyone is hilarious.

Overall I really enjoyed this book, and the ending reveal was a huge shocker moment that exploded the doors open for an exciting sequel.

(Originally posted at http://www.lostatmidnightreviews.blogspot.ca/)

This review is going to be hard to write. Why, you may ask? Well, even months after I read it, my brain is still frazzled from the awesome-ness of it. I decided to pick up Shatter Me after all the buzz it was getting in the book world. The book itself sounded fantastic, and I was really getting excited to read it. I had exams and research essays due at that time so I knew I couldn't read it right away, but I figured I could start it at least. Yeah...it was literally impossible to stop. I would put it down thinking that "Hey, maybe you should, I don't know, actually work on that essay worth 30% of your grade?" but then my arm would just reach out, without an conscious thought of my own, and I would be reading again. It was definitely a midnight read, keeping me up well into the wee hours of the morning. It was worth every minute of it.

I want to start off by gushing about the writing. Tahereh Mafi is so ridiculously talented. The writing in this book was some of the best I've read in any book...ever. Yeah, I'm serious. The words flowed so beautifully, lyrically, it was like the story just lifted off the page. I felt so connected to this book because Mafi's writing made it real. She brought to life these characters, made me completely invested in every aspect of the story, made me feel every emotion the characters felt, and made me unable to do anything else until I read every last word. I wanted to read everything, take in everything, because her writing was just simply amazing.

Now, Shatter Me itself was reminiscent of X-Men, and I loved it. Juliette was a girl to root for, and one to feel pride in. I found myself just hoping and praying it would all work out, because she didn't deserve what happened to her. I can't wait to see how she progresses in the next installment! I have a feeling she's going to make us all cheer. Then, there's Adam. Oh, Adam. Like, way to write my perfect guy, Tahereh Mafi! If the physical description wasn't enough, he has to go and be such a sweet, yet strong guy! The interaction between Juliette and Adam was heart-wrenching, and uplifting. The two of them are simply fantastic characters.

Everything (the writing, characters, storyline, etc.) comes together to create a fantastic, thrill-ride and an impossible to put down book. You will be swept away into a dark and twisted world, with hope in the form of a broken girl who's determination will have you cheering. Read this book. If you only read one book this year, make it Shatter Me.

Pros: brilliant writing, sympathetic protagonist, open to sequels, very fast read, hard to put down /

Cons: some plot twists depended on remarkably good luck/coincidence, ending implies Juliette made a choice she didn't actually make (yet) /

For Parents: some sexual content (kissing +, but no actual sex), some language, some violence /

Seventeen year old Juliette can't touch people without causing them pain and ultimately killing them. Three years ago she forgot this truth and had an accident that still haunts her and sent her to solitary confinement at an insane asylum. /

Her hellish life changes when she's given a cellmate, a boy named Adam who looks familiar. /

This is a book about power, control and sanity. Juliette is surprisingly strong for a woman who's close to losing her sanity due to this power she cannot control. When she comes under the power of the clearly insane Warner, who wants to use her ability to torture and kill those who defy the Reestablishment, the new global world order, she has to make some tough decisions. /

Mafi's dystopic world is horrific, one in which people have given up what freedoms remained to them after the plants and animals became so polluted that eating them meant poisoning themselves. The Reestablishment promised hope, but delivered a totalitarian regime in which a few live in luxury while the rest suffer. /

The writing is brilliant. Like with Patrick Ness's The Knife of Never Letting Go, Mafi knows the rules of writing and breaks them in delightful ways. Each word is chosen with care, as the protagonist makes the most unusual - but intelligent - metaphors. /

Juliette is an intriguing character who is immediately sympathetic. She's never had physical comfort, no hugs, kisses, pats on the back. Seeing through her eyes, it's hard to understand how she survived so long in a hostile world. And she's constantly self-censoring her thoughts, crossing out what she's actually thinking and feeling and replacing those thoughts with ones she thinks others will find more acceptable, because she's spent her life trying to be better and do better so that people will love her. /

There's a pretty intense love story woven through the book, made challenging because Juliette doesn't believe she's worthy of love, despite her yearning for it. So the revelation that her suitor can touch her is quite profound, giving her the sensations she's always craved. While there's a lot of touching and kissing and yearning, there's no actual sex. /

This is a quick read as the book is very compelling and hard to put down. There are some negative points, but you almost pass over them because you want to know what's going to happen next so badly. A few plot points are accomplished by means of supreme luck with regards to the protagonists. Some of their escapes happen too easily given the world and their circumstances. And the ending implied Juliette made a decision that she never actually made (though the implication is that she would make the choice that the book states she already made). /

It's an open ended conclusion that begs for sequels.

Originally posted at http://dazzlingreads.blogspot.com/

Oh.My.Lord!! Truth is, I find no words to start a review for this book. I think "Oh.My.God" is the one little sentence that can abstractly describe my feelings toward it. Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi simply blew my mind, and it did it from the first page until the last.

There are many great books out there but only a few, very few, can engage me to the point that I stop everything in my life to read them. This book absolutely reached that level! Shatter Me is a book I couldn't put down, and I knew I wouldn't until I reached the last page.

From the beginning Mafi' s writing captivated me with an eloquent and unique voice. Juliette voice is so strong and alive that it feels real. To be in Juliette's head was tormenting and lovely at the same time. When we first meet her, she is in a asylum. She has been there for 264 days and haven't seen a soul nor talk to any one during all those days. Her entire life has been suffering and isolation and I couldn't help but feel for her. Yet, Juliette is a girl that, despite everything she's been through, keeps an enormous heart that "all [she has] ever wanted was to reach out and touch another human being not just with [her] hands but with [her] heart." (p.69) The torment of her miserable existence cracked my heart. It felt like seeing someone real shattering right in front of my eyes, with only a tiny notebook and a pen to hold onto life...

"These Words are my vomit.
This Shaky pen is my esophagus.
This sheet of paper is my porcelain bowl." (p.11)

... until Adam shows up. Adam is simply one of the best male characters I have ever read! He is officially Up There with Dimitri Belikov and Jace Wayland and God only knows how much I love those two! Adam is, certainly, a hero that will imprint his own mark in every reader's heart. Besides these two extraordinary characters, there is James and Kenji though I won't say anything about them. I think is much better if readers meet them by themselves. Also, there is another particular character that I absolutely hate, Warner. He is, a terrific villain with a beautiful face and a rotten heart. Tahereh Mafi did the perfect job creating such a monstrous, yet alluring character.

Shatter Me is full with action and romance from beginning to end. There wasn't even one page that I didn't enjoy. The story kept me immersed in the decaying world Mafi created. The detailed descriptions made this world so touchable, so real. But, Shatter Me is not only a book about action and romance. Actually, strong themes such as isolation, war/coup d'etat and environmentalism are greatly important in the story (and in our own world).

"Our people is dying because we are feeding them poison. Animals are dying because we are forcing them to eat waste, forcing them to live in their own filth, caging them together and abusing them. Plants are withering away because we are dumping chemicals into the earth that make them hazardous to our health. But these are things we can fix" (p.307)

I am vegetarian and this paragraph really touched me. Mafi tells a truth, a terrible truth that does happen today but at the same time, in this fictional world, she gives me hope.

Shatter Me is one of my favorite books of 2011. I loved this book to such point, that when I finish reading Shatter Me, I felt that Tahereh Mafi wrote this book for me. The plot is rich in every in every single way and I couldn't abandon my book for more than a few minutes. I was holding my breathe most of the time and every time I turned the page, more and more kept coming. The writing is absolutely captivating. Readers wont be able to get away from the pages that Mafi so extraordinarily wrote! This book is more than an outstanding debut!
Shatter Me will absolutely be one of those unforgettable books of 2011 and readers will probably read this book more than twice! Obviously, I am one of them!