#21: Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver is the seven day story of the death of Samantha Kingston, a terrifyingly realistic high school senior.

As I read this book, I wondered if it would be a good thing to let my girls read.  I ultimately decided that talking to them about the events of the book was a better choice.  Not surprisingly, I heard that many girls at their high school behaved like Sam.  I warned them that they better not be two of them. If so, I was not going to be happy!

Sam begins her story as a very popular, nothing can touch me, I have it all, high school senior on her favorite day of the year: Cupid Day, the day when she and her friends can prove just how popular they are by the number of Cupid Day roses they receive (the bigger your bouquet, the more popular you are).  During this first day, I found myself loathing Sam and her three besties: Lindsay, Ally, and  Elody.  They are the sort of girls I spent 4 years of high school trying to avoid at all costs.  They are the girls I see now at the pool with my own girls and we move away from.  They are not nice girls.  They are the girls I warn my daughters to not become because eventually what goes around comes around.

Now in this particular story, Sam dies in a car accident.  Let me be frank and say that in no way do I think that this is what Sam deserves.  This is simply the plot of this particular story.  There is a slight plot twist: at the end of chapter one, after Sam hears metal crunching and glass breaking and she blacks out, she wakes up at the start of Cupid Day and repeats her day, like Groundhog Day for teenagers.  There are seven chapters in the story--one for each day that Sam repeats Cupid Day.  During her repeats she wonders if she can re-write history, maybe change her behavior and live in the end.  Through a lot of self-reflection and a lot of self-discovery, Sam discovers what should've happened the night of Cupid Day and is able to finally live out her true destiny.

I will be honest and will tell you that, as a mother of two teenaged girls, this book terrified.  The thought of smart, beautiful girls behaving like Sam and her friends is truly terrifying.  I can only hope that this book will serve as a warning for what might happen should anyone choose this path for their lives.

Read this one with caution.

-Dodie