Book Review: The Measure

By Melissa Amster

Eight ordinary people. One extraordinary choice.

One morning, small wooden boxes appear on doorsteps across the world. Inside each is a string that reveals exactly how long its owner will live. From city apartments to desert tents, everyone faces the same haunting question: Do you want to know your fate?

As society tilts between chaos and connection, eight lives become entwined — best friends whose paths diverge, strangers who find solace in letters, a couple forced to confront time’s limits, a doctor unable to heal himself, and a politician whose decision sets off a national reckoning.

In The Measure, Nikki Erlick weaves a sweeping, deeply humane story about choice, destiny, and the fragile beauty of the time we’re given — a novel that asks not how long we live, but how fully.

The Measure was my book club's pick for October and I feel like this is their best pick of the year! I am so glad I finally got a chance to read it. It was thought-provoking, captivating, touching, heartbreaking, and hopeful. It led to a lot of interesting discussions at the book club meeting.

There was a lot of relevance to current events, even though this released three years ago. Almost eerie in some ways, like Nikki had predicted the future when writing this novel. It reminded me a bit of the movie Crash and the novel They Both Die at the End. There were also some similarities between this novel and Here One Moment by Liane Moriarty. 

I liked all the characters except one, who is meant to be a nemesis. Everyone was just really interesting to me and I felt bad for the ones with short strings, as well as their long-stringed loved ones. It made me wonder if I would open the box or not want to know. I'm leaning toward the latter, like one of the characters in this story was resolute about doing. There's a lot of emotional distress, as well as dilemmas about what to do in certain situations. I got really angry with people at times (mostly the villain and the mob mentality). However, there's a nice string of hope woven throughout and you will even see kindness shine through.

My only concern (which was a concern for Here One Moment too) was that the connections were too coincidental. Most of the characters live in New York City, which is huge. How do they all manage to link up so easily? Of course, we could take it as the author finding a segment of the city and taking a snapshot of a group of people who could likely connect with each other due to proximity. 

As soon as I finished this novel, I knew I had to read The Poppy Fields right away and have done so recently. I'll be reviewing that one soon, as well. I highly recommend The Measure and even told my husband he has to read it!

(Trigger warnings below.)

Movie casting suggestions:

Nina: Camryn Grimes
Maura: Alexandra Shipp
Ben: Michael Hsu Rosen
Hank: Chris Sullivan
Amie: Kaitlyn Dever
Anthony: Sam Worthington

Jack: Garrett Wareing

Javier: Xolo Maridueña

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TW: Multiple shootings. Loss of loved ones. Death at a young age.