Destroy Me

This is a nice little character study, not just of Warner but of Juliette as well. Why do I feel like I know her better now than I did after the almost 300+ pages of [b:Shatter Me 10429045 Shatter Me (Shatter Me, #1) Tahereh Mafi http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1310649047s/10429045.jpg 15333458]? Warner's perspective is skewed, obviously, both by his selfish desire to posses her as well as his own self-hatred that views her as an antagonist, a conqueror of his little tar-black soul. Yet his connection to her, the empathy that he feels towards her, seems genuine. This could go somewhere interesting.In my review of Shatter Me I talked a little bit about how the book banks on the fetishization of masculine dominance (and I wrote even more about it here). The fun thing about this is that it flips it a little bit. Sure, Warner still has his aggressive habits, but his inner working speak of a different kind of desire. The one that's in the title. I like reading about men who want to be destroyed by women. Also, it gives an opportunity to see Juliette as she truly could be - not as a trembling cookie-cutter protagonist, but as fucking Kali. She is exactly the kind of goddess that someone as utterly damaged as Warner would worship. The prose is much more controlled here as well, easier to read and much more evocative. Mafi's got the goods. Now hopefully she puts them to good use.