.Review: Destroy Me by Tahereh Mafi

Destroy Me (Shatter Me #1.5)

by Tahereh Mafi

ebook, 111 pages

Published: October 2nd 2012 by Harper

ISBN:

0062208195 (ISBN13: 9780062208194)

Amazon Purchase

Perfect for the fans of Shatter Me who are desperately awaiting the release of Unravel Me, this novella-length digital original will bridge the gap between these two novels from the perspective of the villain we all love to hate, Warner, the ruthless leader of Sector 45.

In Tahereh Mafi’s Shatter Me, Juliette escaped from The Reestablishment by seducing Warner—and then putting a bullet in his shoulder. But as she’ll learn in Destroy Me, Warner is not that easy to get rid of. . .

Back at the base and recovering from his near-fatal wound, Warner must do everything in his power to keep his soldiers in check and suppress any mention of a rebellion in the sector. Still as obsessed with Juliette as ever, his first priority is to find her, bring her back, and dispose of Adam and Kenji, the two traitors who helped her escape. But when Warner’s father, The Supreme Commander of The Reestablishment, arrives to correct his son’s mistakes, it’s clear that he has much different plans for Juliette. Plans Warner simply cannot allow.

Set after Shatter Me and before its forthcoming sequel, Unravel Me, Destroy Me is a novella told from the perspective of Warner, the ruthless leader of Sector 45.

The Original hardcover of Shatter Me w/the girl on the cover, and the new look to the series.

    

Shatter Me (Shatter Me, #1)
Destroy Me (Shatter Me, #1.5)
Unravel Me (Shatter Me, #2)
Untitled (Shatter Me, #3)

        

Brilliant!
Ok, so maybe that is extreme, but let me explain why!

First of all this novella @ 111 pages is told in Warner, the "bad guy" in the first books main pov. It is well written, and offers an insight as to what is really going on inside Warner's head, and boy was it good!

Whoa! Was I surprised how much I enjoyed this book, why, you ask? Because, not only does Mafi take an unlikable character and transform him into somebody that you will swoon over, but you will see a vulnerable side to him. You'll understand and get a slight insight as to why he makes the choices he did, and does, in Shatter Me as well as this book.

We see a softer side to Warner and I enjoyed every sentence in this book.
I also enjoyed reading more from Juliette's notebook and the words that poured out of it, into Warner's mind, as he read her journal and felt every emotion that she was feeling while being locked up in the insane asylum, I think that's what it was supposed to be. Anyway, the feelings and emotions that were written in Juliette's notebook were powerful, to both Warner and myself. I'm sharing some of them below, plus a snippet from Warner's pov.


From Juliette's notebook:

"My face is caked with blood from when they threw me on the ground, and my hands are still shaking even as I write this. This pen is my only outlet, my only voice, because I have no one else to speak to, no mind but my own to drown in and all the lifeboats are taken and all the life preservers are broken and I don't know how to swim I can't swim I can't swim and it's getting so hard. It's like there are a million screams caught inside of my chest but I have to keep them all in because what's the point of screaming if you'll never be heard and no one will ever hear me in here. No one will ever hear me again".

"We followed the tale laid out for us, the prose pinned down in every square foot of space we'd acquired. We were content with the plot twists that only mildly redirected our lives. We signed on the dotted line for the things we didn't know we cared about. We ate the things we shouldn't, spent money when we couldn't, lost site of the Earth we had to inhabit and wasted, wasted, wasted everything. Food. Water. Resources."

Warner's pov:

"I'm trying to focus, telling myself these are just empty words, but I'm lying. Because somehow, just reading these words is too much: and the thought of her in pain is causing me an unbearable amount of agony. To know that she experienced this. She was thrown into this by her own parents, cast off and abused her entire life. Empathy is not an emotion I've ever known, but now it's drowning me, pulling me into her world I never knew I could enter. And though I've always believed she and I shared many things in common, I did not know how deeply I could feel it.
Its killing me."

5/5 Roses

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Review: Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

Title: Shatter Me

Author: Tahereh Mafi

Edition: Hardcover, 352 pages

ISBN: 0062085484

Publisher: Harper Collins 

Published: November 15th 2011

Genre: Young Adult, Supernatural, Science Fiction

Borrowed from Library



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.

Review:    Well written, intriguing plot, cliffhanger ending

Shatter Me was a total surprise. After reading the first few pages I already saw the author's writing style shine through. I actually thought she paralelled the way the world is today with what could happen in the future. The only annoying  part of the book was the strike text throughout the whole book. Example:  My parents emptied their pockets of me and left me to evaporate on a concrete slab.” Now, maybe I'm just, dare I say not a young adult O-o That could of been the reason that I found this element of the book to be annoying and distracting. I'm sure others will not have a problem with this, but I found it to be an element that I could do without. 

Juliette is a young girl who has lived her existence with power. A power to kill with her touch. She has lived as a "freak" of sorts in a seemingly normal world. Her parents disown her, they are afraid their daughter is an insane monster. Juliette is then locked away, alone, in a strange underground,  building. She sees no one, talks to no one and is isolated from everything, and everyone. She is confined to a cell and is allowed one meal and one shower a day. The world is empty for her and the only solstice she has is her notebook , her diary of everything she feels, experiences, are scrawled into this one thing she has left from her past.

Meanwhile, life above ground has changed as the world has gone through a Apocalypse. Loss of homes, business, everything is now a battle to survive. Food is scarce, death has succumbed many. Now people are kept in groups under watchful eyes of a group of leaders who control everything. These leaders have formed a Communism, and rule with an iron fist. With soldiers who are trained and armed.
They have agendas with what they want from people and control food rations, and life in this "new" world.

Adam is one of the solders who is thrown into Juliette's cell. The first person Juliette has seen or talked to in almost a year. She is surprised, confused, and believes he is sent to her cell to kill her.
But, of course things are not what they seem.... He may just turn out to be the only person, able to help her.

I really enjoyed reading this book! Tahereh has a way with words that have you thinking about the world we live in today and what could happen in the future, though I doubt any of us will have supernatural powers! This book reminded me of X-Men, but only because of the supernatural powers.
The characters in this book will have you wondering what agenda's they have, and who  really is the good guy/bad guy. It had mystery, action, suspense, and a pretty good kick a** chick in it, that I can only see getting more and more powerful as she learns what and how to use the powers she has.
This story had twist and turns and although the ending was getting soo good it ended with a cliffhanger!! Oh, whoa is me, I have to wait till what, like next year to find out what happens... :(
4/5 Stars

                                          



Memorable Quotes:

“The sun drops into the ocean and splashes browns and red and yellows and oranges into the world outside my window.”  A million leaves from a hundred different branches dip in the wind, fluttering with the false promise of flight. The gust catches their withered wings only to force them downward, forgotten, left to be trampled by the soldiers stationed below."

"There is still a chance to change things. We can provide fresh drinking water to all people. We can make sure crops are not regulated for profit; we can ensure that they are not genetically altered to benefit manufactures. Our people are 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 the things we can fix.
"We are fed lies because believing them makes us weak, vulnerable, malleable. We depend on others for our food, health sustenance. This cripples us. Creates cowards of our people. Slaves of our children. It's time for us to fight back."