They Both Die at the End - Adam Silvera

My rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

From the cover:

"On September 5, a little after midnight, Death-Cast calls Mateo Torrez and Rufus Emeterio to give them some bad news: They’re going to die today.

Mateo and Rufus are total strangers, but, for different reasons, they’re both looking to make a new friend on their End Day. The good news: There’s an app for that. It’s called the Last Friend, and through it, Rufus and Mateo are about to meet up for one last great adventure—to live a lifetime in a single day."

Mateo and Rufus are going to die today. They both received a call from Death-Cast, and Death-Cast is never wrong. 

Mateo, plagued by anxiety and paranoia, wants to spend his last hours on earth saying goodbye to his best friend and her baby, visiting the hospital where his father is in a coma, and leaving some kind of mark on the world. He wants to...but instead he finds himself still locked away in his apartment three hours after receiving the call, afraid to venture into the outside world.

Rufus, who received the call in the middle of pummeling his ex-girlfriend's new boyfriend, narrowly avoids being arrested for the assault during an impromptu funeral with his foster parents and best friends. Now, alone in the world with less than 24 hours left to live and unable to go home, he isn't sure what to do.

Enter the Last Friend app. After several depressing, sketchy, and disappointing interactions, both Mateo and Rufus are ready to give up on the app. Mateo gives it one last shot, though, contacting Rufus who, with understandable reluctance, agrees to pick Mateo up at his apartment so the pair can begin living their last day to its fullest. But what begins as a partnership of convenience between two dying teenagers quickly blossoms into something more. Mateo inspires Rufus with his kindness and gentle spirit, and Rufus pushes Mateo to take risks, put himself out there, and do the things that he has always been too afraid to try. 

This book is both heartbreaking and beautiful. The relationship that blossoms between Mateo and Rufus warmed my heart, and the way their lives intertwined with the many side characters introduced throughout the story was both fascinating and inspiring. Given less than 24 hours to live, most of us would think, understandably, that this is far from enough time to leave our marks on the world. What this book shows us, however, is that what we see as tiny actions can have a huge ripple effect. They Both Die at the End reminds us that simple acts can have a vast impact.