Shatter Me (Shatter Me Series #1)

by Tahereh Mafi

Overview

The gripping first installment in New York Times bestselling author Tahereh Mafi’s Shatter Me series.

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.

And don’t miss Defy Me, the shocking fifth book in the Shatter Me series!

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780062085504
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	01/09/2018
Series:	Shatter Me Series , #1
Pages:	464
Sales rank:	234
Product dimensions:	5.20(w) x 7.90(h) x 0.90(d)
Lexile:	HL650L (what's this?)
Age Range:	14 - 17 Years

About the Author

Tahereh Mafi is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Shatter Me series, the National Book Award longlisted and bestselling novel A Very Large Expanse of Sea, as well as Furthermore and Whichwood. You can find her online just about anywhere @Tahereh or on her website, www.taherehmafi.com.

What People are Saying About This

Kami Garcia

EARLY PRAISE FOR UNRAVEL ME:“Unravel Me is dangerous, sexy, romantic, and intense. I dare you to stop reading.”

Editorial Reviews

PRAISE FOR SHATTER ME: “Addictive, intense, and oozing with romance. I’m envious. I couldn’t put it down.

Lauren Kate

Fans of Cashore’s Fire, Oliver’s Delirium, and, yes, Twilight will find this addictive.

Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

Rip-roaring adventure and steamy romance scenes, with a relationship teens will root for as much as they did for Bella and Edward. Inventive touches propel the story, such as strikeouts that reveal Juliette’s inner thoughts. The final chapters leave Juliette, Adam, and Warner well poised for round two.

Booklist

EARLY PRAISE FOR UNRAVEL ME: “Unravel Me is dangerous, sexy, romantic, and intense. I dare you to stop reading.

Kami Garcia

Fans of Cashore’s Fire, Oliver’s Delirium, and, yes, Twilight will find this addictive.

The Bulletin for the Center for Children's Books

Fans of Cashore’s Fire, Oliver’s Delirium, and, yes, Twilight will find this addictive.

Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books

Mafi combines a psychological opener with an action-adventure denouement in her YA debut, and the result is a page-turner with a slightly split personality. Juliette Ferrars is 17 and cannot remember a loving touch; indeed, after 264 days in solitary confinement, she can barely remember human contact. Then a boy is shoved into her cell, and her world changes. Just as she begins to trust Adam, guards burst in and march them off to the commandant. Juliette discovers Adam is really a soldier of the Reestablishment, a totalitarian regime that wants to use Juliette because her touch can kill. Juliette wants to get far away from anyone she can hurt or who can hurt her—though she can’t help hoping that, somehow, Adam might not fall in either of those categories. Mafi doesn’t escape some rookie pitfalls; descriptions like “fifteen thousand feelings of disbelief hole-punched in my heart” strain after lyricism, and proof that the divided plot can be brought to a satisfying conclusion must await later installments. Nevertheless, this is a gripping read from an author who’s not afraid to take risks. Ages 14–up. (Nov.)

Publishers Weekly

Rip-roaring adventure and steamy romance scenes, with a relationship teens will root for as much as they did for Bella and Edward. Inventive touches propel the story, such as strikeouts that reveal Juliette’s inner thoughts. The final chapters leave Juliette, Adam, and Warner well poised for round two.

Booklist

Fans of Cashore’s Fire, Oliver’s Delirium, and, yes, Twilight will find this addictive.” %COMM_CONTRIB%Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books

Gr 9 Up—Juliette knows that she is a monster; her touch is fatal. She has been living in a cell in a mental institution for 264 days, all alone. When a boy is brought in as her cell mate, his arrival sparks an explosion of events that changes her life as well as the world. Shatter Me takes place in a future time in which a lack of resources has so frightened the citizens that they have handed over all of their basic rights to a totalitarian government. The regime has plans for Juliette, but she finds the strength to resist the powers that be and joins in a rebel movement, becoming the central figure that everyone is fighting to possess. Mafi sets the scene with the horrendous consequences of ecological greediness and the end result of continuing to demand that the government fix everything and protect everyone. Then she shines a light of hope through the idea that evolution always finds a way to adapt. A romantic angle adds to the suspense as Juliette struggles to trust and to love even though the consequences are death if she misjudges. She narrates the story and shares portions of her journal, which adds to the connection readers have with her. Character development is solid and realistic. The book ends with room for a sequel but not in a cliff-hanger, so teens will feel satisfied yet wait impatiently for more.—Saleena L. Davidson, South Brunswick Public Library, Monmouth Junction, NJ

School Library Journal

A dystopic thriller joins the crowded shelves but doesn't distinguish itself. Juliette was torn from her home and thrown into an asylum by The Reestablishment, a militaristic regime in control since an environmental catastrophe left society in ruins. Juliette's journal holds her tortured thoughts in an attempt to repress memories of the horrific act that landed her in a cell. Mysteriously, Juliette's touch kills. After months of isolation, her captors suddenly give her a cellmate--Adam, a drop-dead gorgeous guy. Adam, it turns out, is immune to her deadly touch. Unfortunately, he's a soldier under orders from Warner, a power-hungry 19-year-old. But Adam belongs to a resistance movement; he helps Juliette escape to their stronghold, where she finds that she's not the only one with superhuman abilities. The ending falls flat as the plot devolves into comic-book territory. Fast-paced action scenes convey imminent danger vividly, but there's little sense of a broader world here. Overreliance on metaphor to express Juliette's jaw-dropping surprise wears thin: "My mouth is sitting on my kneecaps. My eyebrows are dangling from the ceiling." For all of her independence and superpowers, Juliette never moves beyond her role as a pawn in someone else's schemes. Part cautionary tale, part juicy love story, this will appeal to action and adventure fans who aren't yet sick of the genre. (Science fiction. 12 & up)

Kirkus Reviews

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