A Thousand Pieces of You is a lovely book, inside and out.

First of all, THAT COVER. Is it gorgeous or is it gorgeous?!

As I've mentioned on my review of Reader, I'm not really a sci-fi fan. But because of Sci-Fi November, I decided to read more sci-fi novels and watch more sci-fi flicks. A Thousand Pieces of You is one of the newer YA sci-fi novels that was recommended to me by several people. I can see why. Although I suck at Physics, I loved A Thousand Pieces of You.

I didn't read the blurb because lovely cover + recommendations = add to TBR/read ASAP. If I'd read the whole synopsis, I would have known that this is book 1 in a trilogy and I wouldn't have bought it. Nothing against trilogies or series in general but I struggle with waiting for the sequels. I am, however, happy that I went through with it because it's really good.

The concept of multiverse or multi-dimensional travel is not something new, and I've seen a few movies using this. Make no mistake, this is not time travel. Instead, Marguerite, Paul, and Theo jump into parallel (and supposedly, neighbor) universes which are in the same time period as their home dimensions. It was the 21st century (but I can't remember if the book mentioned a specific year) and the world is pretty much advanced. Marguerite jumps into a futuristic London, an imperial Russia, and other dimensions.

The world-building was great, very imaginative and vivid. I know some readers were disappointed that the jumps were not really "neighborly" because the characters went from futuristic London to very backwards Russia -- that was not a jump, that's a leap -- and it looked like time travel, which clearly isn't part of what the Firebird device can do. And maybe that's a flaw, a violation of the premise that Claudia Gray set early on. I tolerated this because I thought neighbor dimensions, which generally should be almost like Marguerite's home dimension with only minor differences, would be pretty boring and tougher to differentiate. Honestly, I just let it past because I enjoyed the Russian dimension too much. This dimension has the most FEELS.



Now that I think about it, yeah, it was strange and impressive at the same time that Marguerite had the best experiences *wink, wink* in a place and time that was full of conflict.

The characters were also well-written. I loved Marguerite. She's strong and brave and a badass. If I was in her position, I'd probably die of heart attack because of all the stressful, terrifying, and exhausting things that she had to go through. Paul and Theo were okay but it was sort of hard to hold on to them because their characters change from dimension to dimension. But I liked them. It was evident from the blurb that there is a love triangle but unlike some readers, it didn't bother me. It was pretty obvious from the get-go who Marguerite was going to end up/fall in love with.

Unlike the love triangle, the plot was not easy for me to figure out. Or maybe I'm just not very smart, no? I was definitely surprised with the twists and turns. They were not explosive but shocking to a certain degree, and these plot twists kept me turning the page. And surprisingly, even though I'm not very good at sci-fi, I enjoyed its unpredictability.


Anyone who loves sci-fi, especially the concept of multiverse, will love A Thousand Pieces of You. It's a quick read and despite the genre, it's not very intimidating as I thought it would be. Go, grab a copy, even just for the cover. :)

And now I leave you with my favorite quote from the book:

"Every Marguerite," he repeats, and the struggle is over.

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