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Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver
Release Date: March 2, 2010
Publisher: Harper Collins
Age Group: Young Adult
Pages: 470
Source: Bought
Buy this book: Amazon

Synopsis (from Goodreads): What if you only had 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: looks, popularity, the perfect boyfriend. Friday, February 12, should be just another day in her charmed life. Instead, it turns out to be her last.

The catch: Samantha still wakes up the next morning. Living the last day of her life seven times 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.

Before I begin I have to confess that this book took me quite a long time to finish. Having said that there were several factors that contributed to this. For one, I found the dialogue stretched too long throughout most of the book. I found that there was a lot of plot dragging in terms of dialogue especially in the middle of the book. 

And secondly, there were too many characters crowded together on the page. A lot of the side characters I encountered I didn't really invest in or care for necessarily. Every couple of pages there would be another character (insert awkward situation pertaining to said side character here) and then that would be it. No mention of them again. It was a little confusing and felt a little like a carousel of characters coming in and out of the plot.

However, despite these two aspects I continued to read and I was glad that I did. Samantha Kingston is a protagonist whose journey was agonizing and heartbreaking too. She and her circle of friends, who share and keep secrets, push the story forward to an unexpected end. Lauren Oliver doesn't disappoint in her beautiful writing as she pulls at your heartstrings one by one.

As I neared the end, however long the journey might have been, I began to feel that feeling of not wanting to let go of the ride, my fingers tightening onto the pages. Also the ending was crushing and unexpected. I know I should have seen it coming but I really didn't, which is to the credit of the author. 

Overall Before I Fall, despite being slightly too long in text in some areas, was beautifully written and had ambition and a lot of heart. Samantha's journey is profound and the overall lesson is a great one we all can learn from.