OUR INFINITE FATES by Laura Steven was suggested to me because of another favorite book of mine – The Invisible Life of Addie Larue by V.E. Schwab.  In fact, it was described as a cross between this beloved favorite and This Is How You Lose The Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone– another book I read and enjoyed.  The description is apt if you have come across either of those books in your reading journey. 

OUR INFINITE FATES is gorgeously written.  The entire book feels like poetry – each line striking a deep chord in my heart.  The story is filled to the brim with love and yearning and joy and pain.  The images are rich and haunting – from the backdrop to the deep ache from the characters. 

Evelyn and Arden are lovers who meet in every life – reincarnated over and over again, always as different people, in new places and circumstances.  In each life, even as they are drawn together by a tug of their souls - they also kill each other, just before they turn 18.  Arden remembers why, but Evelyn has forgotten – so the book is part murder mystery, part love story and a little bit of existential crisis. 

The story takes you through the many faces of Evelyn and Arden through the centuries, back and forth against a 2022 Wales timeline where Evelyn is trying desperately to live past 18 to save her young sister and cling to a life that she has built in her always-too-short existence.  Evelyn and Arden meet as two boys in the trenches of WWI, servers to the emperor in Northern Song 1042, asylum inmates in 1862, Russian lovers in 1986 and countless more. 

“The whole world a backdrop for our doomed love, for our infinite fates.”

This book is classified as YA, and the spice level is mild.  However, the feeling of longing is present throughout – I could not put it down because I wanted to know what life they would live next - and finally solve the mystery of their endless loop of love and murder.  I am not often as curious to skip ahead to find out the ending, but I was tempted.  There is also a touch of descriptions of violence with the deaths, but not too graphic for this slightly squeamish reader.

The ending of this book is perfect – I had the sting of tears at the last line.  A beautiful quotation from Arden sums up my feelings about this book overall, “I love you.  I have loved you, and I will love you.”  Ditto from me.