A review of Numbers by Rachel Ward
Overview:
Numbers by Rachel Ward is a fictional book set in London, England, and follows the 17 year old main character named Jem. Since her birth, Jem has the ability to see the exact date in which people die, via the numbers floating above their head. As you can imagine, knowing exactly when someone will die can inhibit your ability to make friends, so Jem is fairly lonely, Until she meets a guy named Spider. But things take a turn when Jem sees that Spider only has about 3 months to live.
My opinion (spoilers)
I found this book to be fairly entertaining. The pacing was fairly ok and the plot was enjoyable, if a bit overshadowed by the more thematic focuses of the story. I did like the interactions between Jem and spider as I feel like their personalities really worked well together. Some of the moments of the story however, seem to feel rushed or make not a lot of sense however, as there is one point of the story where Jem and Spider go from being normal citizens to being wanted by the police in nearly a blink of an eye. In addition, after about halfway through the story, the pace speeds up to a point where nearly every page has a lot of new information and it was difficult at times to keep up with what the book was saying. But I do think the focus of this book is supposed to be on what it would be like to know exactly when someone would die. It would probably be very difficult to form friendship with people especially if you know that they would die soon. I like how the book chooses to portray these ideas through it's main character and show us the struggles that someone in this situation could possibly face. There is also the moral question being "is is ok to tell someone when they die?"
I can see two reasonable explanations for this question. The first one being that if you were to tell someone when they die they might have time to prepare themselves and do the things they want to do before they die. The second being that the fear and dread of knowing when you die can be overwhelming for someone. The book entertains both ideas in detail and I like how it doesn't pass judgement on either idea, showing how nuanced this concept is. Combining all of this with lots of British slang and a twist that makes you rethink a lot about book makes it a fairly good read.
In conclusion, while Numbers isn't the most complex book, It certainly has some interesting ideas to share and the characters themselves are fairly interesting. 3.5/5, It's pretty good.
Numbers by Rachel Ward is a fictional book set in London, England, and follows the 17 year old main character named Jem. Since her birth, Jem has the ability to see the exact date in which people die, via the numbers floating above their head. As you can imagine, knowing exactly when someone will die can inhibit your ability to make friends, so Jem is fairly lonely, Until she meets a guy named Spider. But things take a turn when Jem sees that Spider only has about 3 months to live.
My opinion (spoilers)
I found this book to be fairly entertaining. The pacing was fairly ok and the plot was enjoyable, if a bit overshadowed by the more thematic focuses of the story. I did like the interactions between Jem and spider as I feel like their personalities really worked well together. Some of the moments of the story however, seem to feel rushed or make not a lot of sense however, as there is one point of the story where Jem and Spider go from being normal citizens to being wanted by the police in nearly a blink of an eye. In addition, after about halfway through the story, the pace speeds up to a point where nearly every page has a lot of new information and it was difficult at times to keep up with what the book was saying. But I do think the focus of this book is supposed to be on what it would be like to know exactly when someone would die. It would probably be very difficult to form friendship with people especially if you know that they would die soon. I like how the book chooses to portray these ideas through it's main character and show us the struggles that someone in this situation could possibly face. There is also the moral question being "is is ok to tell someone when they die?"
I can see two reasonable explanations for this question. The first one being that if you were to tell someone when they die they might have time to prepare themselves and do the things they want to do before they die. The second being that the fear and dread of knowing when you die can be overwhelming for someone. The book entertains both ideas in detail and I like how it doesn't pass judgement on either idea, showing how nuanced this concept is. Combining all of this with lots of British slang and a twist that makes you rethink a lot about book makes it a fairly good read.
In conclusion, while Numbers isn't the most complex book, It certainly has some interesting ideas to share and the characters themselves are fairly interesting. 3.5/5, It's pretty good.
Great review! I’ve read short stories about concepts similar to this, and though I think this idea is interesting, I probably won’t read this book. I like reading books with moral questions like the one being asked in Numbers, but without anything else happening in the book, I probably wouldn’t enjoy it. Also, books without enough explanation for plot twists usually annoy me, so I probably wouldn’t enjoy Numbers.
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