Alma has the unique gift of knowing how many times she will interact with a person, this affects her relationships, decision making and ability to excel at certain things. This all comes with bags full of drama. Alma had a challenging upbringing and has to work hard to steer her life in the right direction, even with the ‘superpower’ she possesses.

As a London girl myself, I appreciated some of the slang and nostalgic elements in the story, I felt it helped me visualise young Alma in her school days. I did however keep finding myself wondering where in the timeline I was, unsure of Alma’s age, sometimes the story seems to skip ahead erratically.

There were some really interesting characters with well thought out backgrounds and personality traits. I particularly enjoyed Alma’s relationship with her neighbour Gordon and the touching storyline involving her Grandmother.

Although I felt a little bit lost at times and would have loved to feel more honed into one main story thread, overall I enjoyed Don’t Count On Me and the concept was fantastic with great characters!

I really appreciate having the opportunity to read this book, thank you Lit Ideas and NetGalley!

Alma has a difficult childhood and struggles to find her way in life. And the fact that she, herself, is different, makes it tougher. Alma’ sees numbers above people’s heads and comes to realise that they indicate how many more encounters she will have with that person in her lifetime.

This reminded me of the numbers trilogy by Rachel Ward, which I really loved, but sadly it didn’t quite live up to my expectations. It was okay, and I liked the way that Alma came to use her unusual ability to her advantage; for example, when job hunting, if she was interviewed by someone with a zero above their head, indicating she would never see them again, Alma could easily predict that she wouldn’t get the job, so no wasted effort required! The concept was clever and the ending was satisfying, I feel perhaps that this would appeal more to a YA audience.

3 ⭐️ Thanks to Netgalley, the author and the publisher for an ARC of this book.

This book is outstandingly good

The whole concept of everyone you see having a number above their head representing the amount of times after this encounter you are going to meet them again is mind bogglingly fascinating,its good,bad,exciting and horrifying and throughout the book I changed my mind over and over again as to whether I would love or hate this,eventually deciding would like it as long as I could control it…

Alma does not have this luxury

Talking of Alma,she is a great character,funny and I mean lol funny in her ‘convos with herself’ and relatable and something just really likeable about her and how she copes with this thing in her life she never asked for

The story is dynamic as is the writing and it is an idea that will stay with you and I will forever look and wonder if a number will appear above peoples heads that I meet….I jest but the story leaves you with something that you cant forget,enjoy and I really hope this does well as deserves

Ten...nine...eight...seven...

Alma sees glary neon numbers above the heads of everyone she sees and the numbers are different for everyone and they are counting down every time she sees them again.

This has gone on Alma's whole life. And it's not something she tells most people or that most people would believe.

I really enjoyed Alma's story (especially her inner dialogue). I loved her life as she got it a little more under control. Her early life rather sucked.

I received this book from Lit Ideas through Net Galley in the hopes that I would read it and leave an unbiased review.

I really enjoyed this. I was going to give it four stars, but I really really liked the ending. I saw the concept of numbers above the head being number of days until death on some TV show somewhere maybe a decade ago, but that show wasn't executed well. I remember thinking that it was such a cool concept and I wished someone would do something better with it someday. Well, this is that book we've been waiting for. I really liked reading about her experiments to understand how the numbers worked, and I really liked reading about her struggle to go from rags to comfort. Thanks for the advanced read.

Alma sees numbers above people’s heads telling her how many more encounters she has. This was unlike anything I’ve ever read. As soon as I started I was hooked and I flew through the chapters. I really laughed at some of Alma’s dialogue, being a millennial and growing up in the same era that Alma did made the book feel all that more relatable. The writing was witty and fast paced, the chapters short and easy to get through. I really really enjoyed the story and would definitely recommend!

The premise of this book is really interesting and it was executed really well. I got into it straight away and even though some of the language used was a bit weird and cringy at times, I still liked it.

The whole concept of seeing numbers above people’s heads to countdown the amount of encounters you’d have with them was so unique, but also creepy. Absolutely not. No thank you, I’d rather not know 😂 it was interesting to see how Alma dealt with it and how she figured out the maths behind the numbers.

I do feel like some of it was rushed, it would suddenly time jump with no warning and no explanation, she would suddenly be somewhere else with someone brand new in the very next chapter with little context.

I did like the way it was written, it read exactly how the character Alma is, and felt very personal and connected me more to her as I got to know her as a person throughout her story.

Overall, I did like this and it would have been a 3 stars, it was so so close to being so, until the epilogue. I took off a star because of my most hated trope, it’s overused and I’m sick of it, I don’t want to spoil so I won’t say what it is.

what a premise and what a fearful one if im honest. can you imagine people lives you see in numbers above their heads. ouch, terrible and frightening in equal measure. so i was interested to see how Claire would write this. and it was done so well. and it made me feel really emotional in parts thinking of this being a scenario. i dont care even if it would have been mental illness causation or another reason, it must be a terrible thing to have to witness out there in the world. live expectancy of people you love above their heads? no way!
Alma's story then was such a brilliant one to follow. i like how she is delivered to us, it felt personal and the writing of her endeared me to the character so much.
i found myself wanting to be able to read quicker just so i could know what was going to happen next and where this story would take us. i did have to stop and think sometimes too. the concept was one and the delivery was one that made you want to think, forced you to think. but it also never overwhelmed you as a reader or leave you feeling heavy. Alma has us smiling with her wit more than a few times too which was some great breakers.
i was invested in this book from start to finish and enjoyed my time with it so much.

this was a scary concept and worked well in this universe, I was engaged from start to finish and thought the overall feel in the genre that I was wanting. The characters were so well done and really felt for Alma. I was invested in what was going on and thought the plot of the book worked overall. Claire Camden has a strong writing style and was able to create characters that I cared about.