Shatter Me Starter Pack: Books 1-3 and Novellas 1 & 2: Shatter Me, Destroy Me, Unravel Me, Fracture Me, Ignite Me

by Tahereh Mafi

Because some people are so stupid that they actually think there are thick neon lines separating good and evil.

hell is empty and all the devils are here

“On the darkest days you have to search for a spot of brightness, on the coldest days you have to seek out a spot of warmth; on the bleakest days you have to keep your eyes onward and upward and on the saddest days you have to leave them open to let them cry. To then let them dry. To give them a chance to wash out the pain in order to see fresh and clear once again.”

“Nothing in this life will ever make sense to me but I can’t help but try to collect the change and hope it’s enough to pay for our mistakes.”

“The truth,” he says, “is a painful reminder of why I prefer to live among the lies.”

And I think, if I could do it over again, I’d do it so differently.

how horrible and beautiful it is, that our eyes blur the truth when we can’t bear to see it.

revenge I think has never looked so sweet.

There’s a strange kind of freedom in the dark; a terrifying vulnerability we allow ourselves at exactly the wrong moment, tricked by the darkness into thinking it will keep our secrets. We forget that the blackness is not a blanket; we forget that the sun will soon rise. But in the moment, at least, we feel brave enough to say things we’d never say in the light.

I am no longer afraid of fear, and I will not let it rule me. Fear will learn to fear me.

No gun, no sword, no army or king will ever be more powerful than a sentence. Swords may cut and kill, but words will stab and stay, burying themselves in our bones to become corpses we carry into the future, all the time digging and failing to rip their skeletons from our flesh.

Maybe we both fell in love with the illusion of something more.

And I think here, in him, there is more feeling than any one person should ever have to contain.

I will be unapologetic. I will live with no regrets. I will reach into the earth and rip out the injustice and I will crush it in my bare hands.

It’s the kind of kiss that inspires stars to climb into the sky and light up the world. The kind that takes forever and no time at all.

Words are like seeds, I think, planted into our hearts at a tender age.