Ignite Me by Tahereh Mafi
Release Date: February 4, 2014
Publisher: HarperCollins
Genre: Young Adult Dystopia
ISBN: 978-0062085573
Source: Bought
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With Omega Point destroyed, Juliette doesn’t know if the rebels, her friends, or even Adam are alive. But that won’t keep her from trying to take down The Reestablishment once and for all. Now she must rely on Warner, the handsome commander of Sector 45. The one person she never thought she could trust. The same person who saved her life. He promises to help Juliette master her powers and save their dying world . . . but that’s not all he wants with her.

The Shatter Me series is perfect for fans who crave action-packed young adult novels with tantalizing romance like Divergent by Veronica Roth, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, and Legend by Marie Lu. Tahereh Mafi has created a captivating and original story that combines the best of dystopian and paranormal, and was praised by Publishers Weekly as “a gripping read from an author who’s not afraid to take risks.”

Ignite Me by Tahereh Mafi is a beautiful conclusion to the Shatter Me trilogy which is without question, one of my favorite trilogies of all time. The moment I opened up Shatter Me, I knew I was in for an amazing ride. I knew Tahereh Mafi would become one of my favorite authors. The moment I opened up Unravel Me, I knew I would be taking away so much more from Mafi’s characters, story, and her writing as a reader, writer, and human being. She blew my expectations out of the water. The moment I opened up Ignite Me, everything I thought I knew was turned upside down and I still am in awe.

Ignite Me is a bold departure from the first two books in the series. For one, there are no strikethroughs. Zero. At first, I was disappointed. Then, I remembered I was disappointed that there weren’t as many strikethroughs in Unravel Me as Shatter Me. Then I understood why they gradually went away. Juliette’s growth is intertwined with the writing style and that is so beautiful. The strength and power and control within Juliette ignites in the finale and it truly is a magnificent sight.

Can we talk about Mafi’s writing style for a moment? It’s what made me fall in love with this series in the first place. It’s so poetic. It’s so fluid. It’s so eye-opening. It’s such art. I am in awe of Tahereh Mafi’s writing style. She is a wordsmith without question. She’s made me see words (and people and the world) in ways I never saw them before. Pan-icked and hope-less stand out to name a few words I see differently now.

As for the story itself. I love that it picks up quickly and everyone has their own plans (or non-plans) which they must then decide whether or not to put altogether to be on one accord. After all that Juliette, Adam, those from Omega Point, and Warner have gone through, a decision like this isn’t easy to make. It takes time and I think Mafi did a fabulous job with the pacing here. It was true to form. I loved Juliette finally realizing and accepting the power within her. I loved the final showdown between Juliette and Anderson. My only issue is the build up of the gang training to fight in the war and once you get to the end, since we’re following Juliette, we don’t get to see any of them actually fight in the war…which I completely understand but I still wanted to see it.

Finally, we have the characters. I was thrilled to see Kenji having quite a role in this book but on the downside, Castle takes quite a step back. I didn’t expect Castle to be so silent and surrender so fast. He lost so much but he gave up so much too. He deteriorated before our eyes and while he recovers from that, finding out that he really didn’t have the power to lead this war felt wrong somehow. Yet another character who deceived themselves. Ignite Me kind of felt in so many ways like an unraveling of what was built in the first two books. I can definitely see how readers would have a problem with that. But when you think about it, we deceive ourselves so much of the time in our search for truth. That’s life. We are constantly discovering that everything we thought we knew wasn’t clear the way it is now. Here, there’s this incredible balance of revelations clearing up what we thought we knew and revelations for the set of conflicts that arise in this book on its own. Everything fell into place. Even…

The love triangle. Let me start off by saying that I am not often moved by romantic relationships and as an extension of that, I don’t typically get too invested in love triangles. So I can’t say that I was enjoying all of the relationship drama (which was magnified here as Juliette had to make a choice and took up the majority of the book) every single second but I can say that the delivery was fantastic. Emotions ran high, tension most of all and boy did I feel it. Oh, the passion!

Yes, it was sad to BEGINNING OF SPOILER learn of/confirm Juliette’s feelings towards Adam. END OF SPOILER I can accept her reasoning though it still felt like getting hit by a train you thought was picking you up but instead was on the way to crush you, even if or especially because it went off track. I wasn’t Team Adam or Team Warner though I was leaning towards Adam in Shatter Me and more towards Warner in Unravel Me.

All of that said, I love that these characters are growing and they have their reasons and the way that they react to those reasons are with fault – also known as…human. They are all so broken and that is something you can never forget while reading every page. I loved seeing Warner so vulnerable. So honest with himself, with others. The same with Juliette. More than ever before. The pieces of everyone’s lives are shattered and they’re all trying to put those pieces in the right spaces. Everyone has the same goal. If a piece is shoved in the wrong spot, someone is going to get cut. It’s that simple. What’s so amazing about the growth of these characters is that there’s hope even for Warner in the end. Especially after he finds out about his relation to Adam and James. I don’t really cry but if I did, the scene where Warner finds out about this connection of theirs would have been a moment full of tears.

Long story short, Tahereh Mafi has delivered an excellent conclusion to the Shatter Me trilogy and I cannot wait to see what she writes next.

Ignite Me by Tahereh Mafi is available today.