19 March 2015

Review: Ignite Me by Tahereh Mafi

Title: Ignite Me
Author: Tahereh Mafi
Published: February 4th 2014
Source: Hardcover
Pages: 409

Goodreads | Amazon
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.

REVIEW

    I could not keep this review spoiler free there were just too many things that I have to discuss! You can just skip right down to the 'Verdict' section which is spoiler-free and summarises my opinions. Do check out my spoiler-free review of Shatter Me or Unravel Me if you want to get a feel for the series.

    I read this IMMEDIATELY after finishing Unravel Me because Unravel Me was good and it exceeded my expectations! Ignite Me started off really well with 2 plot twists in chapter 4 and it was so amazing! We got to know so much more about Warner and I really enjoyed how he was starting to open up more as a character! At this point I was really excited and glad about his character arc.

However, I started to realise that Adam was essentially getting thrown under the bus so that the readers would hate him and naturally lean towards Warner. I DIDN'T LIKE THIS AT ALL. Adam did a 180 and he became this raving lunatic from Juliette's POV although she did sort of cheat on him in the last book didn't she? Their quarrels/fights were so juvenile and it was so so boring, I fell asleep twice while reading about their pointless quarrelling. We already know where this is going so let's just get on with it. I think Mafi's intentions were clear the moment she turned Adam into an uncaring bastard who wanted Juliette dead.

I still did not like Juliette in this final instalment, she was just too much of a drama queen for my tastes. Why does she suddenly decide that she wants to be the supreme commander? Hello do you even know anything about the world!? Does she think that having this invincible super power is enough to rule the world? Warner known everything about leading and he has the experience that should make him the prime candidate for this. It felt like Mafi was trying too hard to sell Juliette as a heroine. You don't have to be a leader/rule the world to be a heroine (refer to The Hero's Journey). It was quite unrealistic that she suddenly became so ambitious when she had never showed any interest in the rebellion or even leading a group of people, up until now. Unless we get a novella or something that shows how she is doing as a supreme commander, I have serious issues with this convenient ending.

Speaking of the ending, it felt rushed and I barely remember the final 'epic' battle that they were planning and prepping for for the entire book. It was unsatisfactory after slogging through the very slow pace for 3/4 of the book.

I enjoyed Unravel Me for its inconvenience (there were so many obstacles) so it was disappointing to see the 'perfect'/convenient wrap up of the series. I didn't like the direction that this book headed, even Warner lost some of his spunk in the first 2 books. He became so weak and was only capable of obsessing and pining over Juliette, he hardly did anything 'ruler'-related in this instalment. There was too much angst in this one.

To end off on a good note, Mafi's writing remains amazing, if not better and it was the highlight for this book. 

VERDICT

Don't get me wrong, Ignite Me was a very entertaining read and critically I didn't like a lot of aspects of the book but the personality of most of the characters and the amazing writing really held my attention. This was a fun series and I recommend this to anyone looking for a light dystopian that is not too heavy on the world building, focusing more on character development.

If you can't stand it when authors make convenient choices that changes a character completely or when characters do things that are completely out of character for the convenience of the plot then you might want to either skip this series entirely or just stop at book 2.

Plot: 2/5 
Pacing: 2.5/5
Originality: 3/5 
Writing style: 4.5/5
Characters: 3/5 
Feels: 2.5/5
Cover: 4/5
Overall rating:  

0 comments:

Post a Comment