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A review by amyvl93
They Both Die At The End by Adam Silvera
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
The emotional manipulation really got to me okay!?
They Both Die at the End follows Mateo and Rufus, teenage boys who live in a version of the world where you recieve a phonecall at midnight on the day that you die to inform you that at some point in the next 24 hours you will die in some way. For various reasons, they both join the Last Friend app - an app that allows people living their last day to match with a friend to spend their time with and the novel follows their last day together.
A lot of what I liked about this novel was the concept that Silvera creates, a world that is like ours but that confronts mortality as something that you can have an element of control over - with entire apps, websites and venues supporting you to live the best last day you can. In addition to Mateo and Rufus's narratives, we get other people's stories woven in between - those that are also living their last days and those that are not but are impacted by the death focused world.
Mateo and Rufus are polar opposites in many ways - Mateo has lived a quiet life trying to avoid bringing any danger into his life particularly as his Mum died giving birth to him & his Dad has been in a coma, and Rufus is much more sociable, building his own chosen family after losing his own in an accident. Their characterisation and indeed a lot of the characterisation is fairly one-note, although I did like the diversity of characters that Silvera brings to the pages in this novel. I found Mateo and Rufus' friendship really evocatively drawn and whilst I could have done without the romance sub-plot near the end of the book I was generally very drawn to these characters.
Whilst some of the messaging is quite heavy-handed I did generally really like the world Silvera built and getting to spend time with Mateo and Rufus and their friends.
They Both Die at the End follows Mateo and Rufus, teenage boys who live in a version of the world where you recieve a phonecall at midnight on the day that you die to inform you that at some point in the next 24 hours you will die in some way. For various reasons, they both join the Last Friend app - an app that allows people living their last day to match with a friend to spend their time with and the novel follows their last day together.
A lot of what I liked about this novel was the concept that Silvera creates, a world that is like ours but that confronts mortality as something that you can have an element of control over - with entire apps, websites and venues supporting you to live the best last day you can. In addition to Mateo and Rufus's narratives, we get other people's stories woven in between - those that are also living their last days and those that are not but are impacted by the death focused world.
Mateo and Rufus are polar opposites in many ways - Mateo has lived a quiet life trying to avoid bringing any danger into his life particularly as his Mum died giving birth to him & his Dad has been in a coma, and Rufus is much more sociable, building his own chosen family after losing his own in an accident. Their characterisation and indeed a lot of the characterisation is fairly one-note, although I did like the diversity of characters that Silvera brings to the pages in this novel. I found Mateo and Rufus' friendship really evocatively drawn and whilst I could have done without the romance sub-plot near the end of the book I was generally very drawn to these characters.
Whilst some of the messaging is quite heavy-handed I did generally really like the world Silvera built and getting to spend time with Mateo and Rufus and their friends.