The First to Die at the End Review

No-one is going to lose me. I'm not going to be lost. I'm going to live.

The First to Die at the End

by Adam Silvera

Genre: YA Fantasy

About: Valentino has just moved to New York and is ready to start his modelling career. Orion has a heart condition that means death is always a hop, skip and side-step away. In Time Square, close to midnight, the two boys meet for the first time. But there's another first about to happen: Death-Cast is about to debut. If you get a call it means you have 24hrs to live. Both their lives are about to change, but only one phone is ringing.

The Good

I'm not crying, YOU'RE crying. Or you will be if you pick this book up. I wasn't sure how I'd feel about a prequel as I loved They Both Die at the End, but I think I might love this one more... Valentino and Orion are just so unbelievably adorable. Obviously this book made me sob and sob and sob but I also laughed out loud so many times. The romance is just so darn cute! Expect heartbreak of course, but know that there's plenty of sweetness on the way to the end.

I also really loved the suspense in this one. Death-Cast's job is to take out the mystery of who will die but there's a twist that leaves you worried for a lot of the characters.

The writing is fantastic with so many quotable lines and very distinct POVs. It moves between rom-com, thriller, tragedy and lands ultimately, for me, as contemporary poetry.

The Bad

I do think the prequel should have added to the world building as the fantasy component to this story is definitely its weakest. In the first book there's a lot of questions about Death-Cast which could have been explored here but instead remain a mystery. Given the page count and the cast of characters (including a coder who I thought would hack the system, and the head of Death-Cast who was the system), I expected some answers and was left disappointed.

The Somewhat Iffy

Gloria makes some poor decisions. I loved her character and my heart went out to her, but I couldn't believe when she came back to the apartment with her son and Rolando to tell Frankie - a man who has put her in hospital before - that she was leaving him. OF COURSE that would end violently. And then to let the police talk to her son without herself or a lawyer present? I couldn't understand it.

Overall

This is very much a repeat of the previous book and maybe didn't need to be 500+ pages, but I also don't really care because I LOVED it. In equal parts adorable and equal parts heart-breaking.