Shatter Me

Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

Okay, yall…….

Who the hell told me to read this book?

I can not remember which one of you lovely book adoring friends recommended it….but whoever it was, I do not think highly of you right now 🤣

I mean, I COMPLETELY get WHY you would think I would like this one….it’s YA …dystopian….first in a series… has a little romance…. allll things I GENERALLY am pretty into.

But lisssssteennnnnn…..this book was NOT IT for me, friend.

Here is the summary to fill yall in a bit:

“One touch is all it takes. One touch, and Juliette Ferrars can leave a fully grown man gasping for air. One touch, and she can kill.

No one knows why Juliette has such incredible power. It feels like a curse, a burden that one person alone could never bear. But The Reestablishment sees it as a gift, sees her as an opportunity. An opportunity for a deadly weapon.

Juliette has never fought for herself before. But when she’s reunited with the one person who ever cared about her, she finds a strength she never knew she had.”

Why is it a thing that so many YA book summaries are SO SHORT?

And DECEIVING?!?

At my first glance, I thought this book would maybe have some vibes close to “The Power” by Naomi Alderman (which BTW was a freakin’ AWESOME read). Like a similar story but for teens.

Ummmmmm…NO. That was NOT the case.

Because that book was hella intriguiging and thought provoking. A bit twisted and dark but fasincating.

This one??

The complete opposite in all ways, shapes and forms.

What I think usually draws me into dystopian story vibes is that there is *just enough* reality in the destruction of human society that it is believable. That genre hits close to home…. it isn’t hard to visualize the end of civilization as we know it if we continue on our current path of destruction with the enviornment, war, treatment of each other, etc.

It is depressing and unsettling at how real it all can seem to us…BUT…we know that what we are reading is JUST a story. There is a level of a “could be” reality but usually there are plenty of things thrown in to keep it far fetched enough so we can remind ourselves it is fiction…. makes us feel better about our current horribleness and that we aren’t “that bad” quite yet. 🤦‍♀️

But this dystopian story yall just did not hit me like other books of it’s kind have done.

It is TOO predictable with it’s whole formula—even for a YA book. The villianous regimen trying to establish a “better” society than the one destroyed before it, unusual romantic interest for the main character, weak (yet also really strong deep down) heroine.

The plot is choppy and doesn’t flow or progress in a logically smooth way. Often times things just kinda HAPPENED outta nowhere. 🤷‍♀️

The romance was also IRRITATING AF. The surprising, weird progression of it COMPLETELY came from nowhere and made NO KIND OF SENSE. I know this is fiction and it’s YA and fantasy and blah blah blah…..but GEEEEEEEZZZZZZ.

I wanted to quit this book at the half way mark BUT yall know I try so hard to be a committed reader and finish what I start….it’s gotta be SO HELLA BAD for me to stop reading….so I pushed on thru the trash story to the end.

There are many unanswered questions I had at the end of the book which obviously is intentional…but got on my nerves. Like, what is really up with the main character? Does she have like super powers? Some kind of magical gift? Is she brainwashed? Misunderstood?

And also…what is happening in the rest of the world? Is the reestablishment really that bad? Or is something else happening there? Can humanity truly be saved? What underground operations are happening?

The thing is though….I DON’T REALLY CARE.

I am zero intrigued to continue on to the next book in the series to see the answers.

ALSO….

This is NOT a great book to do an audio version for.

The narrator’s voice definitely sounds age appropriate for an older teen but yall….it is REALLLLLLLLY nasal and high pitched. It was super irritating to me. It kept reminding me of Gretchen Weiner’s voice from Mean Girls except on speed or something…It did not help that I listen to audiobooks at 1 1/2 or 2 times normal speed 🤣 That made it SO much worse than it needed to be! LOL

Plus, there is this weird pen scratch sound that I could NOT figure out the point of while listening…after a few chapters being confused, I totes had to Google it. That informed me that the sound is Juliette scratching out her thoughts in her journal and replacing them with different ones.

Even once I figured this out, I was like “Wait…which thought was scratched out? That one? Or the other one? Which one did she REALLY say or REALLY feel??”

If you do decide to read this book, STAY AWAY from the audio if you have a choice.

Okay…so obviously I didn’t like this book.

Even though it DID have tons of things I usually completely love.

Maybe I was just super grumpy the past week or something.

Or maybe it’s just not that great of a book in general…

I can’t say for sure LOL

Needless to say though…I am NOT continuing on this particular literary series adventure.

BYEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.