As is obvious from previous reviews, I have a bit of a pre-occupation with certain genres of fiction. The teen death thing is a big one for me and I suppose it stems from the same place as a fascination for tv shows like Waking the Dead and Bones. I’ve gone into this before so I’m not going to repeat myself but, suffice to say, I do love books with this deeper meaning; the struggle, as it were, between life and death.
Before I Fall follows one repeating day in Samantha Kingston's life. Fairly soon into the beginning of the book, our main character dies in a car accident. She then wakes up to find herself starting the same day over again. And so it continues.High school is hard and Sam has climbed her way through the social ranks to make life easier on herself. In doing so, a lot of people have been pushed aside and this story is, in this way, a typical ‘popular girl sees the error of her ways, discovers what life’s really about, blah blah blah ’. Thing is, the spin on this, the repeating days, giving her chances to fix all her wrongs, is definitely interesting. It’s not entirely unpredictable though. Once you reach a certain point in the story, you can kind of see where it’s going to end up, although how she gets there is executed well.
Before I Fall is above all a beautiful novel. Oliver’s prose style and her ability to give us a different take on each repeated day is really spectacular. It’s also the first book in a little while to really grab me and give me that ‘I really want to finish it but I don’t want it to end’ feeling. It also had me sobbing my heart out at midnight as I finished it, which to me, is always the sign of a story and a character that has really sunk in. Considering I only picked it up because I was interested in Oliver’s new novel, Delirium, I’m certainly glad I did.
Many, many urgings for you to read it.
