Soulmates And Other Ways To Die - Melissa Welliver

Good News: We alll have a soulmate.

Bad News: Your soul bond means you feel their pain before you've even met.  And if your soulmate dies ... you do too.

Control freak Zoe is determined to stay alive - and single.  She carries a survival kit for every eventuality, but even she can't prepare for a match with Milo Spencer, a boy who lives for recreational danger.  It's time to find a cure...

I thoroughly enjoyed My Love Life And The Apocalypse when I read it last year (you can read my review here) so the chance to read another YA end of the world romance by Melissa Welliver wasn't something I was going to turn down.  The Easter holiday is the perfect excuse for me to curl up with chocolate and lose myself in a book, and I certainly lost myself in this book, devouring it in under a day!

Soulmates And Other Ways To Die is set in a dystopian future, in a world where everybody has a Kin Twin, somebody who is their soulmate.  People don't know when, or if, they will discover their soulmate but they know that the Kin Twin mutation is visible when people are in close proximity to their soulmate, which is how teenagers Zoe and Milo discover their connection.  It's Zoe who is injured following a near-miss which means that Milo also feels her pain and injuries.  However, the news doesn't go down well: Zoe is intent on remaining single and safe (she and her mother are survivalists) and Milo loves to court danger.  On the surface, Milo and Zoe are two very different people. In fact, until the accident and the announcement brought them together, Milo hadn't even realized Zoe was in the same classes as him. However, now they have been thrown together, will the connection prove true?  

Kin Twin sounds like the perfect way to ensure successful marriages and finding your happy ever after, but there's a down side: when your soulmate feels pain, so do you; when your soulmate passes out so do you; when your soul mate dies, so do you. As a result, the death rate in the UK has doubled which is why people like Zoe and her mum have become survivalist. They are uber-conscious about everything they do and are completely risk averse.  But then there are rumours of a lady known as Madame Scissors who has a cure that can sever the bond. Milo and Zoe set off to try to find her and to break their bond, but this could put them in even more danger than they could have possibly imagined.

The premise of the book is incredibly thought-provoking.  How would you feel if you knew you would die if your soul mate died? Is that OK if you know and love them? What if you've never met them? What if they pass out whilst you're driving which causes you to crash and die? How do you know your feelings for your soul mate are real?  

This is a love story with a difference and is perfectly entwined with the sci-fi/apocalyptic theme.  Zoe and Milo are wonderfully relatable characters and readers will enjoy getting to know them through the dual narrative. With touches of humour woven into the fast-paced plot, the book is difficult to put down.  

Out now, Soulmates And Other Ways To Die is guaranteed to make you think and make you smile - I loved it.