They Both Die at the End
Ratings515
Average rating3.7
It's been a while since I really enjoyed a YA contemporary romance. But this was just beautiful
I wish I liked this one more than I did. The plot is good. Death cast is a company that calls people on the day they are going to die so that they can live and appreciate those last hours doing whatever they think is appropriate for that occasion. That's the best thing to take away from the book: to sort of realize how short life is so we can enjoy it as best we can. It's a cliche idea but a very powerful one if we really think about it.
The problem I have with this book though, is that the middle part of it was not enjoyable. It has a great beginning and end but the rest is not up to par.
Even though we know what will happen in the end it manages to keep the reader engaged and even a bit surprised as the last passages unfold. However some things felt tedious and even forced as if it was the Hollywood adaptation of the story and that's where this one lacks the power to be rated higher.
Very quick, concise prose that sets everything up clearly and deliberately. The characters and story come together at exactly the right pace and leaves one curious on how the new dynamics are going to unfold and how deep and meaningful the story is going to get. Really strong set up in the first and seconds acts that does touch on some bigger thoughts and emotions. The ‘straightforwardness' of the writing enhances the flow and the unfolding of the journey while the linear, time-stamped story-telling devices work really well to shape the story. There seemed to be hint with about 100 pages left that might make someone wonder about the potential for a very clever endgame, and while the ending was mostly satisfying (if not a tiny bit ambiguous), it wasn't quite as surprising or twisty as it could've been.
second time reading, just as good as the first
Merged review:
second time reading, just as good as the first
i really enjoyed the lack of a plot twist and love the message of living your life instead of surviving it
4.5 stars
I have to thank Jonny for recommending this book as our next buddy read. He actually suggested several but I had already read 2 of them and the other one I couldn't get. It may have not been the first choice but in the end I am so glad we went with this one because we both loved it and I am kicking myself for putting off reading this one for so long.
The title of this book is a complete spoiler so we know going into it that both of the main characters are going to die in the end we just don't know what their journey to death is going to be like. I loved both Mateo and Rufus. They went from strangers to friends to being in love all within a day which is very insta lovey but it totally worked and was very believable. Was their love real or was it manifested just because they were dying? Who knows and honestly who cares I loved them so much.
This is an own voices book. Mateo is a gay Puerto Rican and Rufus is a bisexual Cuban plus Mateo has severe anxiety so there's lots of representation in this book and I think it was portrayed very well.
I only had 2 complaints about this book. While the majority of this book is from Rufus and Mateo's POV there are POVs from several other characters as well most of which play small parts in the overall story. I would have preferred to have it all be from their perspective because honestly I just wanted more of them. The other complaint is that it ended abruptly and while the way one of them dies is implied I would have liked his death to have had a little more page time. I feel like he deserved that.
I really enjoyed this book and again I don't know why I waited so long to read it because it's truly a great book. I will for sure be reading the next book in the series and hopefully I will get to it sooner rather than later.
when i first started the book i wasn't sure i was even going to like the main characters. but here i am baking cookies to comfort myself at their loss.
Didn't we all wondered at some point, what we would do if we knew what we would do if we knew when our time is up? I am not sure if I want to know when my end day is. But I would love to know that today, tomorrow etc I am safe. And this is what I take more of this book...
What if you knew, today you are not dying!
I really liked this book and the idea behind it, I liked the LGBTQ+ inclusion and the way it was written.
What I didn't not like is the extra POVs which made no sense, took me out of my zone and where to long, to boring.
Was a little slow in the beginning but very intriguing, it rapidly picked up in the 2nd half of the book.
Because I'm offended at how bad this book was, yet how many glowing reviews it gets, I shall be extra blunt.
You know it's not ding well when at about 8% in, this became a hate listen/read.
The plot for this book would have been better suited to a short story, but in a different author's much more capable hands. Instead, we have a bloated mess, and it's not that long of a book.
This is yet another book that insists on switching the point of view of each chapter from one character to another. I'm chalking it up to creative writing exercises that belong in class, not jammed into a published work. Switching from Mateo to Rufus and back again-sure. Endless side characters who do absolutely nothing to propel the story? Nooooo. Annoying.
The characters are really blah. Mateo is suuuccchhh a jerk. Is the reader supposed to like him? What kind of person finds out it is their last day to live and decides to sit in the house for hours playing video games and spending a whole bunch of time chatting with random people on a “Last Friend” site? Instead of spending time with their one friend or talking to their comatose Dad? Sure, those last two things happen eventually, but are short and stupid moments in the book, as opposed to memorable.
The world building was atrocious.
The karaoke scene and quotes from other songs were supposed to connect us to this DeathCast world, but it just seemed forced and lead to eye-rolling.
The fricking ending. I was HOWLING with laughter at how ridiculous the book wrapped up. Mateo stops Rufus from shooting that dude who took his girlfriend. Mateo and Rufus (who have no chemistry the entire course of the book) run off and decide to BONE at Mateo's because suddenly they're in love. Then Matteo dies in a fire because Matteo got up to make them tea. HAHAHA. Then Rufus finds himself in intensive care from smoke inhalation damage and calls Matteo a hero. WHAT?!
The audiobook was also annoying. Taking a long pause every time the word “and” is uttered does not improve the experience.
There are a few things working against the story, first it happens in 24h which makes a slow burn kind of love story development impossible. Second, it's in first person, with the author trying to imitate teen speech(“it was mad real yo”), not a fan, and this style of having the characters speak to us as if breaking the 4th wall continuously, also brings me out of the story. Finally, the message of the story was too on the nose and i don't even agree with the message. All in all it's a meh from me.
”Two dudes met. They fell in love. They lived. That's our story.“
This world has Death Cast, which can predict the day everyone is going to die. On the beginning of each day, the company's employees call everyone who is going to die until midnight.
This is what happens to Matheo and Rufus, as well as to Delilah, Howie and Vin.
What I liked about the story:
- I loved that the book included other characters POV, how their stories were connected and when and where they crossed paths. This was a beautiful way to show that life would continue and was moving on.
- I liked the premise of the book and I think it could have been more developed to create something great.
- The book made me think about goodbyes and what I would like to be able to do, how different people grieve and deal with death. I would never remember about singing despite my love for music or sending postcards and leave books behind to be found on a bench. I'm grateful this book opened my eyes to these possibilities.
What I think it could have been done better:
- I was expecting a love story but, for me, this one was poorly executed. I didn't feel much attraction, wanting and pinning between the characters which ultimately, left me unsatisfied when it finally happens. Moreover, they just go to Matheo's place to nap. What are these teenage guy hormones doing on their last day alive? I think this was probably to avoid the obvious ending of them dying together, happy in each other arms, but it felt unnatural to me.
- I wanted more as a message than “Carpe Diem”
- I wanted more backstory on the Death Cast and the lack of it left me with several questions that kind of spoiled the book for me:
Problem 1: What exactly is the positive impact of knowing you are going to die? Is it to live fullest the last day?
At some point the novel mentions “Mr. Poland, would tell us “how good we got it” for having DeathCast's services. He'd assign us reports where we reimagined periods of significant deaths—the plague, the world wars, 9/11, et cetera—and how people would've behaved had Death-Cast been around to deliver the warning. The assignments, quite honestly, made me feel guilty for growing up in a time with a life-changing advancement, sort of like how we have medicine to cure common diseases that killed others in the past.”
I'm very curious about those essays as I fail to understand how this can be considered a life changing advancement as everyone dies anyway.
If this existed in 9/11 what would be the difference? The twin towers might still exist because no one would want to spend the last they alive working. They would, however, die different deaths and I like to think everyone wanted to save the lost lives rather than the towers. Would it be able to avoid Afghanistan invasion and subsequent deaths? Would it stop people suffering from lung conditions after the attack?
Does Death Cast exist outside USA? If it exists around the world, the terrorists would know they will die and therefore be sure the attack would be successive, destroying the towers anyway, resulting in what we already know.
And regarding the plague... What could possibly be the positive impact of death cast? Wouldn't who receive the call want to go all “Carpe Diem” and spread the disease even more? Unless we can know sooner, and the plan was to reinforce quarantine. Again, would this prevent future deaths or death is something set in stone?
Problem 2: I'm not sure this world works with suicides. You wouldn't try suicide if you didn't receive the call as you'll be sure it would be a failed attempt. However, if you indeed received the call, why would you choose to commit suicide if you'll be dead anyway at the end of the day? I only see this scenario working for terrorists.
Problem 3: By knowing you are not going to die that day you might be tempted to have a more reckless behaviour and harming others.
This is a nice and easy read, with a greater potential to be loved by Young Adults (its target). I also think readers who can ignore the unexplained sci-fy bit and just read this as a contemporary novel would achieve a greater enjoyment of the book.
okay woah. 3 stars cos it got bland in the end and didn't make me emotional but the first half of the book hit wayy too close to home especially the whole hospital stuff.
so where do i start. this book was like an actual reality check. i'm not even kidding, it was like a jab to my face. i didn't realize my shitty approach to life until i read this, it really makes you value life a lot more. we're so used to chasing materialistic things and accumulating wealth and when it's our last hour, we realize we didn't get to have that one convo w that friend or hug them for the last time.
i'm acc going to be living my life like i just got my death cast call cos woah this book is an eye opener on what we should be acc valuing. time to undergo an ego death.
i hated the pov part and the line ‘he didn't get a call from death cast cos he isnt gonna die' omg that was just so annoying. peck was just irrelevant asf. we get one single pov from his gang member and um? it was unneccessary asf imo it seemed so forced.
i was loving the platonic friendship between the two until they kissed, i was like WHAT. YALL JUST MET. THIS IS TRAUMA BONDING PLEASE NOT LOVE. anywya that irked me cos platonic friendships are just as special as romantic, if not more. It seemed so out of place considering we only know roof is bisexual and there's like barely any lgbtq stuff throughout the book and it just gets shoved down my throat at the end.
i hated how delilah didn't get a little spotlight, i really enjoyed her character. i hated how lidia and matteo didn't revisit ‘old places' and traditions they have one last time like a boring movie marathon or one more scroll the park together. otherwise it was fine.
i almost cried. ALMOST. (at the first half) but yeah this book definitely did impact me.
Really late to the game with this book but better late than never I guess. I enjoyed the story as much as possible knowing going into it that both of the main characters were going to die at the end. (Not a spoiler when it's the title of the book!)
My only complaint is that because I knew the outcome going into the book, I didn't let myself get as attached to the characters as I normally would. According to BookTok, I should have been in a massive puddle of tears at the end but because I knew what was coming, it was not as emotional of a read for me as it could have been. But overall, it was an intriguing read and kept me on the edge of my seat. Definitely recommend!
For most of the book, I disliked the writing style, and the book has a weird focus on “interconnectivity” of life. The writing seemed too simple, but also the story seemed too often jump between being too slow by also too fast, brushing over detailed. I also generally dislike the concept of a 1-day love story, However, towards the end the book, I feel the level of emotion increasingly picked up. In the end I was surprised / impressed that I felt more emotion than I was expecting from a book with such a foreshadowing title
Adam Silvera has a particular and insistent obsession with breaking the reader's heart in his books. Worst thing is, I'm still interested in reading more of his novels.
4/5 stars
I'll probably edit this review later on when I have better processed what I just read.
Summary
In this world, you get a call to inform you that you're going to die 24 hours before it happens. You don't know how it'll happen. In this case, both Mateo and Rufus received this call on the same day. Both can't say goodbye to their loved ones. Mateo can't because his father is in a coma. Rufus, on the other hand, made a mistake that made his friends unavailable to him. They meet through an app meant for these types of situations called “Last Friends.” From there, they go on to befriend and help each other out.
Review
One of my favorite things about this book was how their friendship developed. Neither decided to mope or just lay down because of the call they received. From there, we see them progress through multiple situations and grow from them.
Mateo was one of my favorite characters in this book. This was mainly because I could relate to him even more than I did to the other characters. Throughout the book, Mateo deals with his father being in a coma and his problems caused by his social anxiety. We see him overthink a lot in the beginning. We see this slowly progress into him learning how to cope with all his anxiety. I really liked how this was dealt with. I have seen other books completely cure characters of anxiety, so this was a nice change. His death definitely affected me the most. He didn't deserve to die the way he did.
Rufus was a more complex character, and it took me more time to understand him and/or relate to him. Rufus is one of the more reckless characters in the book. If we look more into his actions, we will see how this affects him throughout the book.
The side characters were also part of what made this book so enjoyable. From being a fully developed character to bringing in their own perspective, it allows us to further understand how everything is connected. Even in the case of Peck, we can understand the motives behind his actions.
They Both Die at the End is a book worth reading. Although I was a bit iffy on whether or not it was worth reading, I'm glad I did. The book is more dialogue-based, but it still manages to create well-developed characters. The different perspectives definitely made this book better in terms of getting to know the side characters. The connection between everyone was also well done. This did make me more emotional than I expected. If you want an emotional read, this is a book you should read.