Review: Restore Me by Tehereh Mafi

Restore Me by Tahereh Mafi
Narrated by Kate Simses (Narrator), James Fouhey (Narrator)
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I'm using this for my Popsugar Reading Challenge Prompt for a book published in 2018.  I've been waiting for this book for a while and I really liked it.  I loved the original books and their companions and I can't wait to see where the rest of the series goes.  The audio book was a great option.  I kept pushing off the e-book because of time commitments, the audio was a great option for me. I thought the narrators did a good job with Juliette and Warner and the rest of the characters.

This picks up just weeks after Ignite Me ends, Juliette is now the Supreme Commander of North America and in charge of Sector 45. She has Castle and Warner by her side to help her through the politics and day to day leadership that comes with the end of a war, but she is overwhelmed. She doesn’t quite know what she’s doing and the rest of the Reestablishment isn’t quite sure what to make of her. They send emissaries in the form of the children of the other Supreme Commanders to get to know her and attend a summit being hosted by North America. She learns new information about her past and Warners’s past. Juliette isn’t pleased by what she learns and her power surges out of control. The ending is a total cliffhanger, but we learn some pretty interesting information. I’m anxious to learn where we are headed next.

Mafi’s writing is exceptional. It is lyrical and poetic, and I love the way she tells stories. There are parts of this that are significantly more adult than the past series. There is more violence and intimacy, and the writing is beautiful. This book is significantly more character driven than plot driven. There is a plot twist at the end, so I suspect the next book will be more plot driven. There isn’t much world building; I suspect this is because the world doesn’t play much into the story quite yet. This almost feels a bit like an origin story.

The characters are so broken in this. It makes them feel different than what I remember from the first series. They grew in the first set of books and they were strong at the end of Ignite. Here they have let the trauma set in and they are broken and insecure again. It is like they are starting over and letting all of that self doubt back in. Juliette doubts all of her abilities, Warner is a mess, they have communication issues, and their relationship suffers. I do like how we get excerpts from Juliette’s journal to give some perspective on her inner monologue and Warner addresses his anxiety issues. Kenji is now the comic relief, which I appreciated, he was really funny and the story needed that. We don’t get much Adam in this, and when we do he is also broken. I do like some of the new side characters. As a fan of the original series, I really enjoyed this new installment and I’m looking forward to the remaining books. I suggest keeping an open mind when reading because it isn’t the same, but it is still good and fans will still enjoy it.

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