Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi (Shatter Me #1)

Genres: Young Adult, Sci-fi, Dystopian, Paranormal, Romance 
My Rating: 5 out of 5

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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.

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This was fascinating. I loved the story, and the characters, and the writing, and the message. I loved how the writing mirrored Juliette's state of mind and her image of herself. As her life became more stable and purposeful, so did she and the writing. It was a unique insight into the MC's mind which we dont usually gain through traditional narration. And I would not be surprised if Juliette was actually OCD or bipolar. I dont know much about those two conditions, but Juliette does seem to struggle with something besides her surroundings.

"Hope is hugging me, holding me in its arms, wiping away my tears and telling me that today and tomorrow and two days from now I will be just fine and I'm so delirious I actually dare to believe it." 

Juliette is a remarkable person. Being mistreated, abandoned, and imprisoned at such a young age, I am surprised she didnt turn out more like Warner, although they do have far more in common than she seems willing to admit. They have both been written off by their parents (in Warner's case just his father), are feared for who or what they are, they both have remarkable power of some kind, and they are both prisoners in their own lives. It seems clear to me that they are also both looking for love and acceptance. 

"All I ever wanted was to reach out and touch another human being not just with my hands but with my heart." 

I enjoyed Adam's character in the beginning. I found it really interesting how he used to know Juliette when they were children, and that he joined the military to find her. Its an interesting backstory. And he was a sweetheart. But as time went by and we saw more of him and met other, more interesting characters, I realized that he was just a Gary Stu. There wasnt really anything special about him. 

"In the absence of human relationships I formed bonds with paper characters. I lived love and loss through stories threaded in history; I experienced adolescence by association. My world is one interwoven web of words, stringing limb to limb, bone to sinew, thoughts and images all together." 

The story seemed to be a lot about identity. About learning who you are, not letting other ppl tell you who you should be, and also not labeling others, or judging them by the face they show the world. I suspect as the series progresses, we will also see a lot of growth, from Juliette as well as other characters, as their true identities continue to be revealed to us, as well as to themselves.