Luke's Book Reviews #8: This Is Where the World Ends by Amy Zhang

Do you ever have those authors who wrote a first book that you absolutely loved, and because of that, you wait for their next title with bated breath? That happened to me with Amy Zhang's debut Falling into Place, a skillfully written novel about the most popular girl in school attempting to commit suicide following Newton's Three Laws of Motion. Not only was the novel published when Zhang was only 18 (*applause*), but I remember sitting on the couch back in December 2014 and reading the last 100 or so pages while holding back tears/squealing because I loved it so much. The book was written in an interesting fashion, utilizing the nonlinear style and an interesting narrator to tell the story from multiple points of view. Although the subject matter itself had been seen before, it was done in such a unique way that I couldn't help but find it a gem.

Due to my love for her debut, Zhang's second release was eagerly awaited by me, and although all it had was a title for nine months, I was excited nevertheless. When the cover came out, I was more excited than ever because a) LOOK AT THE PRETTY! and b) the synopsis sounded amazing. However, reviews for the ARCs started rolling in a couple months later, and a lot of people had mixed feelings about it. For one thing, they said that the synopsis actually had a huge spoiler in it (you might be able to guess it from the cover), and that although the writing was good, they didn't seem to like our characters and found them really unlikable. I was surprised by these reviews, most notably because I wasn't getting any particular predictable vibes from the novel, and the fact that Zhang had made Liz sympathetic in Falling into Place even though she could be incredibly cruel to her fellow classmates and even her friends. I had some mild hesitation going into this, but I still had high hopes, and once this came into the library on hold for me, I swooped it up and immediately dug in.

So, how was This Is Where the World Ends? Was it on the level of Amy Zhang's debut novel, or were there some pieces missing to make everything complete?