Just Like Fate: review

Title: Just Like Fate
Authors: Cat Patrick and Suzanne Young
Rating: 4.5 stars
Source: review copy from the publisher for an unbiased review
Summary: Caroline is at a crossroads. Her grandmother is sick, maybe dying. Like the rest of her family, Caroline's been at Gram's bedside since her stroke. With the pressure building, all Caroline wants to do is escape--both her family and the reality of Gram's failing health. So when Caroline's best friend offers to take her to a party one fateful Friday night, she must choose: stay by Gram's side, or go to the party and live her life.

The consequence of this one decision will split Caroline's fate into two separate paths--and she's about to live them both.

Friendships are tested and family drama hits an all-new high as Caroline attempts to rebuild old relationships, and even make a few new ones. If she stays, her longtime crush, Joel, might finally notice her, but if she goes, Chris, the charming college boy, might prove to be everything she's ever wanted.

Though there are two distinct ways for her fate to unfold, there is only one happy ending...
Review:

   I hear parallel universes are the new dystopian now, eh? Well count me in because this is my first book in the subject, and I'm a fan already. (Honestly, I think I've seen quite a few parallel universe stories out there the past few years, I just avoid them because I can't stand mirrored covers. But I'm getting past those shallow thoughts...slowly)

   Picking this book up to read was a no-brainer since I've been a huge fan of Cat Patrick's from the start, and more recently started fangirling over Suzanne's newest book, The Program. I haven't read many co-authored books...actually at the moment, I can't recall a single one. I definitely recognized Cat Patrick's writing style over Suzanne Young's, but that's probably because I've read more of her books, and I've only read Young's dystopian/futuristic-esque. One thing I'm curious about; how did they write it? I wonder which author wrote which decision?

   So as far as the story goes, you have the two different paths, "stay" and "go" which flip each chapter, and I am so glad the choice is written on the bottom of each page because I think I would have gotten confused and mixed the two up. They're obviously different, but the same events happen this way and that, and I had to pause and trace things back from time to time. At first I was rooting for the events of "stay" to be the real one, (or whatever is supposed to happen at the end) but my opinion quickly swayed back to "go" and I liked the story a lot more in those chapters.

   From the perspective of a newbie in this branch of sci-fi, it was very cool to see a character's different choices. Like, instead of screaming in frustration for choosing one way or another, I was like, oh, I get my way too. So now I will be on the lookout for more parallel universe books, if anyone has good recs, I'm all ears. Just Like Fate is a light read; I read it in a day. But it did have some good thought provoking aspects for teenagers, and I really liked that. Also, the ending is satisfyingly ambiguous.

-Jane

To read my reviews of Cat Patrick's books: Forgotten, Revived, The Originals
And my review of The Program by Suzanne Young is here.


Thanks again to Simon and Schuster for the book; this review is in no way biased, these are my honest thoughts.