Restore Me by Tahereh Mafi ★★★
“I cannot let the broken girl inside of me inhale all that I’ve become. I cannot revert back to another version of myself. I will not shatter, not again, in the wake of an emotional earthquake.”
Restore Me takes us back to the past of the characters we love
When I first heard that Tahereh Mafi was going to add three more books to this series, I lost it. I was so delighted that there was going to be a continuation to this series. I read the first three books a couple of years ago and they meant so much to me. All the wonderful characters with their complex personalities. It felt like I could relate to them and what they had been through. The pain I felt at that time in life felt a little bit more bearable and all this thanks to miss Tahereh Mafi.
Even though I was really looking forward to reading this novel, it took me quite a while to really start. I was so busy with my studies and life that I didn’t pick it up right away. But the moment I picked Restore Me up and finally started reading I got sucked right back in the Shatter Me universe. I finished it in a couple of days. The novel was easy to read and captivating enough to want to read the next chapter right after finishing one. The book is written in two point of views: Warners and Juliettes. This was a plus, because Warner is such a complex character and reading his thoughts really added something more to story. The book is 435 pages long.
I feel conflicted about this novel. I did not adore the book as much as I expected to. There were definitely good aspects to the story like the new characters who are introduced and a look into the past of characters such as Warner, Juliette and Kenji. But in the end the book felt, how to put it, empty. There was not a lot of action in Restore Me. It felt like Tahereh Mafi used this book to catch up with the storyline and give us more of the friendship between Juliette and Kenji and the relationship of Juliette and Warner. In the story Juliette just became commander of Sector 45 and she has no idea what she’s getting herself into, which is to be expected from a girl who has no clue of how the real world works since she has been in an asylum for the last year. Castle on the other hand knows it all but doesn’t take action. He is only there to constantly remind Juliette and Warner that they’re still kids and they have no idea what they’re doing. Something that was annoying. He keeps repeating himself without doing anything about the situation.
There is also a lot of humor in this book that’s quite misplaced. Kenji is seen as the funny one of the gang and Tahereh used him to lighten up the situation they’re in. He jokes a lot of the time without reason. Kenji has opened up quite a bit in this novel and I’m excited to learn more about him in the next book. Now about Juliette, I didn’t really like her in Restore Me. She was not as strong as in Ignite Me and just had a wrong image of how things work in the real world. But maybe that’s quite normal for a girl who’s been locked away for almost a year. The way she acted in certain situations felt out of place and not really Juliette-like. I really liked Warner in Restore Me. He knows what he’s doing but also leaves some room for Juliette to get used to the situation. He’s trying to become a better person, to be more compassionate and friendly The storyline itself wasn’t like the previous books in the series. I expected more.
Even though there are things I didn’t like about the book, like the humor and the lack of action, it was really nice to read about these characters again and I liked the new elements the author introduced in the book, like the new characters and friendships. I feel like the next book will be so much better. They way Restore Me ended, gives me hope for the future. This book should have been a companion novella. I gave three stars because there were a lot of elements and things I did not like. Reading about Warner, Juliette and Kenji felt wonderful though, so I gave Restore Me the benefit of the doubt. I’m excited to see what happens next in Defy Me!
Restore Me is the fourth installment in the Shatter Me Series. It was released a couple of years after Ignite Me. The series will have a total of ten books to its name:
- Shatter Me (#1)
- Destroy Me (#1.5)
- Unravel Me (#2)
- Fracture Me (#2.5)
- Ignite Me (#3)
- Restore Me (#4)
- Shadow Me (#4.5)
- Defy Me (#5)
- Reveal Me (#5.5)
- Imagine Me (#6)
heavenlybookish 