Any book that opens with four children being told the date of their eventual deaths is unlikely to be a lighthearted read, and The Immortalists holds true to that. With predicted lifespans ranging from 20 to 88 (if the fortune teller's words are even to be believed), the Gold siblings deal with their sentences in ways befitting their unique personalities. Some let go and indulge in reckless hedonism; some struggle to maintain control of a life that seems frozen by predestination.
The author does a good job of placing each sibling's story in a vivid setting, the most well-drawn of which is the Castro in 1980s San Francisco, on the eve of the AIDS epidemic. Connections between some events and characters in the story may seem a bit contrived, stretching readers' suspension of disbelief. However, in a story that has at its center the question of free will versus fate, it's possible that the author could be using these apparent missteps to play further with the concepts of randomness and destiny.
The author does a good job of placing each sibling's story in a vivid setting, the most well-drawn of which is the Castro in 1980s San Francisco, on the eve of the AIDS epidemic. Connections between some events and characters in the story may seem a bit contrived, stretching readers' suspension of disbelief. However, in a story that has at its center the question of free will versus fate, it's possible that the author could be using these apparent missteps to play further with the concepts of randomness and destiny.