Review Detail

The date is September 5, 2017 and Mateo Torrez and Rufus Emeterio are both going to die. Thanks to an app called Last Friend, they find each other and commit to spend their day in the best way possible—whatever that means.

THEY BOTH DIE AT THE END should be an incredibly sad book about dying, but instead it’s a manual on how to live. Author Adam Silvera shows how we’re all part of a single tapestry, and intersections with others can have a significance you might never understand. Mateo and Rufus are both beautiful souls, and though they are each flawed, their imperfections help strengthen the other. The day that they spend together might seem unremarkable to someone who doesn’t know them; fortunately, we get to know them both really well through some great character development.

In the midst of Mateo and Rufus’s story are the stories of many others. We just catch glimpses of some of them, and others receive a bit longer look. It’s understandable that none of them are as well put together as the two protagonists, but there are instances where the glimpses seem a bit too contrived and they distract rather than sharpen the focus on the two I really wanted to see.

This book would be a wonderful addition to a high school classroom. The conversations and debates I imagine it generating among teens would be awesome. Adam Silvera has created a fascinating, modern coming-of-age story, and I look forward to sharing it with others so that I can talk about it.

My thanks to the publisher and YA Books Central for a copy of the book in exchange for my honest review.