Before I Fall [Kindle Edition]

Lauren Oliver (Author)

Book Description

What if you had only one day to live? What would you do? Who would you kiss? And how far would you go to save your own life?

Samantha Kingston has it all: the world's most crush-worthy boyfriend, three amazing best friends, and first pick of everything at Thomas Jefferson High—from the best table in the cafeteria to the choicest parking spot. Friday, February 12, should be just another day in her charmed life.

Instead, it turns out to be her last.

Then she gets a second chance. Seven chances, in fact. Reliving her last day during one miraculous week, she will untangle the mystery surrounding her death—and discover the true value of everything she is in danger of losing.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

In this Groundhog Day meets Mean Girls teen hybrid, Sam Kingston is pretty, popular, and has a seemingly perfect boyfriend. But after a late-night party everything goes terribly wrong, and the life that she lived is gone forever. Or is it?

At the start of Before I Fall, Sam is self-consumed and oblivious about the impact of her actions on others. But as she repeatedly experiences slightly altered versions of the hours leading up to her death—and her relationships with friends, family, and formerly overlooked classmates bloom, end, or shift—it’s impossible not to feel for the girl whose life ends too soon. Oliver’s adept teen dialogue and lively prose make for a fast, page-turning story in which the reader is every bit as emotionally invested as Sam. --Jessica Schein

From School Library Journal

Grade 9 Up—Samantha Kingston has worked her way up the popularity ladder; now a senior, she and her three best friends rule their school. On Cupid Day, Sam expects to receive Valentine roses, to party with her friends, and to finally (maybe) have sex with her equally popular boyfriend. The last thing she expects is that she will die, but in the final moments of her life, as she hears "a horrible, screeching sound—metal on metal, glass shattering, a car folding in two," everything turns to nothing. Only, it is not the end for Sam. She wakes up to start the same day over again, and again; in fact, she relives it seven times. At first, being dead has its advantages, as she realizes that nothing worse can happen to her. She first conducts herself with reckless abandon, seducing her math teacher and smoking marijuana. It is difficult to feel pity for Sam; she is snobbish, obnoxious, a cheater, and just plain mean. However, her gradual and complete transformation is so convincing that when she finally puts others before herself in order to save another life, it is moving and cathartic. The deepening relationship between Sam and Kent, her childhood friend, is sensitively described and the most complex and compelling relationship in the story. Although somewhat predictable, the plot drives forward and teens will want to see where Sam's choices lead. Fans of Gabrielle Zevin's Elsewhere (Farrar, 2005) will enjoy this almost-afterlife imagining.—Amy J. Chow, The Brearley School, New York City
(c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• File Size: 555 KB
• Print Length: 496 pages
• Publisher: HarperCollins; Reprint edition (March 2, 2010)
• Sold by: HarperCollins Publishers
• Language: English
• ASIN: B0038B99PK
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray: Enabled
• Lending: Not Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,579 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
  • #45 in Kindle Store > Kindle eBooks > Teens > Literature & Fiction

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

111 of 119 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Haunting, heartbreaking, beautiful February 7, 2010

By The Compulsive Reader VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

Friday, February 12th should be just another average day for popular, beautiful Samantha Kingston. But it's far from it--her ride home after a late-night party ends in a car accident, only when Sam wakes up, it's Friday, February 12th again. Forced to re-live the last day of her life seven times, Sam struggles to understand the meaning behind these experiences and the significance in her own life and actions. Because only when she can get her last day exactly right will she ever be able to take the next step.

With keen insights and startling candidness, Lauren Oliver's debut novel is a frank, if not at times brutal look at high school social circles and the careless cruelties and bullying that occurs on a daily basis. Sam is one of the mean girls, and she shrugs off her biting words and actions as something that just happens, collateral damage of living through high school. But through every complex and carefully plotted event, Oliver peels back the layers of Sam's life and teaches us all that every little deed has a consequence, and no act goes unnoticed. Though Sam is by no means a likable character at the beginning of the novel, as her character is revealed and she learns a thing or two about the things she has done in her life and the person she has become, she morphs into a true, selfless, and caring heroine, despite her many flaws. The story line is addicting and suspenseful. and as each "day" passes and Sam begins to get things right, the question that has been looming in the back of your mind since the end of the first chapter--What will happen to Sam?--becomes more and more urgent. Oliver is skillful at wielding suspense and heartbreak, making you think hard about the value of your own life and actions.

Before I Fall is a haunting and beautiful book. It will float around at the back of your mind long after you've read it.

54 of 65 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars If you knew THEN what you know NOW- what would you do? February 21, 2010

By L. J. Schrader

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

Sam is the kind of girl we can all hate. Popular, snotty, superior. In life, you could have pointed out her bad behavoir and she probably would have laughed in your face, or honestly, not cared at all. But, in death she is forced to take a good, long look at every choice she has made in her relatively short lifetime.

We get to know Sam and her friends at the beginning of the story, leading up to a crash that takes Sam's life. You have to be patient as you are introduced to them because they are not likeable at all. Just when you think you've had enough of them, they are in a deadly crash. That's not the end of the story, though, only the beginning.

Sam goes into a sort of sleep following the accident and awakens to relive her last day. Will changing something along the way lead to a different result? She tries, and tries again, and again. In fact she gets numerous attempts to "perfect" her last day, hoping she can make the most of her life...and her death if can't undo the accident.

This is not your typical tale of redeeming yourself. It's not so easy to make the changes that Sam needs to make to change fate. She doesn't simply do something new each time she gets a new day. Her first attempts are vastly different with vastly different results. It's not until she puts all the finest pieces together that she thinks she has the best solution. Life is unpredictable and so is death for Sam.

Watching this aggravating girl realize how wrong she has been is satisfying. Seeing her struggle to become a better person with only one day is fascinating. Wondering how (and if) she is going to succeed makes you not want to put this book down. Great read!

Note to parents: This book does contain a lot of references to drinking, drugs and sex, but nothing graphic.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars parts were amazing, and other parts weren't June 22, 2010

By Tabitha VINE™ VOICE

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Vine™ Review (What's this?)

I'm torn. I absolutely loved parts of this story, and really did not like other parts. So, overall, I'm pretty lukewarm about it. And kind of confused, so there is much I want to explore here.

When I first started reading, I really didn't like Sam. At all. She is everything I am not, and that I vehemently disagree with. I set this book down three times, reading other books instead. But I kept picking it back up because this is the kind of story that requires a lot of character growth, and the promise of that kept me reading. Still, I had a very hard time with the beginning, and I'm still torn about that.

On the one hand, I can see that Sam's character needs to be established so that we can see, and truly appreciate, her growth later on. So, I agree that we need to see her so unlikable, otherwise we can't fully appreciate her growth. I truly believe the beginning needed to be this way...and yet, I still didn't like it. This is unusual for me. The needs of the story can usually persuade me into overlooking things I might not like, and that just didn't happen in this case. I think that if she had grown just a little bit quicker, then I might have liked it better...it was difficult to dislike her for so many chapters, and I found myself mumbling `come on, grow up already.'

The middle is the best part of the whole book. Sam's growth is very natural to the story, and very well done. I loved seeing her open her eyes to the world around her, and acknowledging how her actions have reactions. Sometimes severe reactions. When she realizes this, she grows leaps and bounds. I started rooting for her to figure out how to end her predicament, and was glued to the pages.

But then we got to the end, which I completely disagree with. Granted, the last couple paragraphs are powerful and leave you with a contented feeling of finality, but the events leading up to them didn't fit with the rest of the story.

SPOILER WARNING.

Throughout Sam's growth, she works very hard to help others, one of them being Juliet Sykes. And Sam is relentless in trying to get Juliet to understand that she can't give up because her actions will have reactions that can severely affect others. This is one of my favorite parts of the story, and I eagerly anticipated the ending because I wanted to see how Sam would succeed (and I was convinced she would succeed). But then everything fell apart, because Sam was the one who gave up. Everything she says and does on her last day screams that she's given up. In doing so, she disregards everything she's learned about actions and reactions.

Again, this is a part of the book where I'm torn, because I do believe the story needed to go in this general direction, and the ending was right for the story--*except* for the part where Sam gives up. She accepts her fate way too easily and lets herself slide away with no thought to those who love her (one of the arguments she uses on Juliet). If she had fought and struggled and regretted at least a little bit, then the ending would have been far more powerful, even if the end result had been the same.

I don't think I've ever been so torn over a book, and can't even decide whether or not to recommend it. Some parts are amazing, and other parts really turned me off. If you like stories about popular kids and high school parties, then you might like this one. If not, you might want to pass. Also, the age range is definitely young adult (not middle grade) because of scenes with drinking, drugs, and sex.

More About the Author

Lauren Oliver captivated readers with her first novel, the New York Times bestseller Before I Fall, a Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year. She followed that up with Delirium and Pandemonium, the first two books in her bestselling trilogy, which concludes with Requiem. Delirium has been optioned for film by Fox 2000 Pictures. Oliver is also the author of two luminous novels for middle-grade readers, The Spindlers and Liesl & Po, which was named a Kirkus Best Book of the Year. A graduate of the University of Chicago and NYU's MFA program, Lauren Oliver lives in Brooklyn, New York. You can visit her online at www.laurenoliverbooks.com.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lauren_Oliver
www.lauren-oliver.tumblr.com

Amazon Author Rankbeta 

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#13 in Books > Teens

#13 in Books > Teens