Review: The Merge - Grace Walker

Genre: Science Fiction Published: Mariner Books, November 2025 My Rating: 2/5 stars

“I knew that she was right. She would forget me. but perhaps I could make sure of it; even long after she was gone, the world would never forget her.”

It took me a while to put my thoughts to paper, as this book gave me the biggest whiplash I’ve experienced in a long time. For the first half or so, it was on a five-star-course. I absolutely loved the ideas this book engaged with, and was hooked into the story. Then some of the cracks started to show, but still, the incredibly strong moments in between more than made up for it. Until the ending came in…

Prepare for a long-winded rant incoming at the end of this review, because I have a lot of thoughts…

The Story:

Pitched as a Black-Mirror episode in bookform, The Merge follows a near-future England where a highly controversial and experimental procedure to merge two people’s consciousness into a single body, is pitched as the solution to the growing overpopulation problem.

We follow Amelia and her mother Laurie, who volunteer for the experimental Merge in a desperate attempt to save Laurie, who’s mind and body are deteriorating from Alzheimer's disease. Together with 3 other duo’s – a terminally ill teenager merging with his brother, a father merging with his addict-daughter, and a couple merging in order to raise their baby together in a single body – they start the preparation process of the Merge. Only to begin to question if this truly is the solution to stave off their goodbyes, the way they hoped it would.

What I loved:

The idea of the merge and all the ethical-, emotional and societal concerns that brings with it were fantastic. Through our 4 main duo’s, Grace Walker does a great job of exploring the different aspects of these questions in a well-rounded manner. I love sci-fi that gets me thinking and this book had me pondering its themes for days after I finished it.

Although some of the societal issues were interesting (would this actually be a valid solution of overpopulation? What legal rights would a Combine have, and would they differ from the rights of 2 separate people, etc.), it’s the personal repercussions that truly hooked me. What would you be willing to risk to never say goodbye to someone you love? To have them “live on” as a part of you, literally. And would joining be a form of bliss or a curse in the end?

Through Laurie and Amelia, we get a glimpse into the answers to that question, and had the book continued in that vein, it would’ve been an easy favourite.

Bonuspoints for the audiobook, for the excellent use of different voice-actors to differentiate Laurie’s voice from Amelia’s, including post-merge. I recommend this format if you’re interested in reading this book.

What I didn’t love:

About halfway through, the book took an absolute nose-dive in terms of quality, only to end in an actual wreck of an ending. For the first half, we follow the lead-up and preparations for the merge, which is where the story shines. Then we switch to post-merge, when Laurie and Amelia are reduced to the singular “Laurie-Amelia”. Here, the plotholes that were lurking at the background before, truly start to take center stage. Things don’t add up, leading the characters ánd the reader to only one possible conclusion.

That conclusion is finally presented as an end-twist that genuinely ruined everything that came before it for me. There’s no way for me to talk about this without spoiling the ending, so only continue reading below the divider-bar if you’ve read the book, or don’t plan to.

In conclusion, I couldn’t be more disappointed. This wasn’t the worst book I’ve read in 2025, but had I fallen from my expectations to the reality of this book, I’d have broken every single bone in my body…

You can find this book here on Goodreads.

SPOILERS AHEAD!

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In short, the big twist is that the Merge isn’t real. There’s no personality-merging technology, and the whole project is a big government-aided hoax to fight overpopulation and get rid of the “undesirables” of society. A.k.a. the sick, the underprivileged and the social minorities. One half of the Combine is simply killed off and disposed of, while the remaining one is convinced of the presence of the other through hypnosis. So Laurie-Amelia isn’t real. It’s just Amelia… Her mother is dead and she’s been tricked into hearing her mum’s thoughts and feeling her presence through hypnotic suggestion.

This twist sucks for several reasons:

1. It’s not a surprising “twist”, despite being presented as such. The amount of plotholes surrounding the merge-technology are so glaring that the only logical conclusion is that it can’t be real. Instead of being shocked by the discovery, I was questioning the characters intelligence for believing this was real long before.

2. Ironically, instead of solving the plotholes by copping out of them, it simply creates new ones. Instead of having to explain the Merge-technology, you now have to explain this advanced hypnosis-technique to me – which isn’t done… You’d also have to convince me how the government (let alone multiple governments, since the Merge is set to go global in the end) came to the logical conclusion that this was the best way of solving an overpopulation problem. How did they keep this a secret? Who is in on it? On top of all the practical and ethical concerns – and I hate to be this dark about it - : there are easier ways of getting rid of your population than this elaborate scheme…

3. By copping out of the Merge itself, we also cop out of engaging with the questions that made the book interesting to begin with. How far would you go to preserve the person you love? What parts of your identity makes you you etc., is suddenly replaced by “Government BAD”. Either might have worked as central theme for this book, but cramming them both in, left both underdeveloped.