Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver: Book and Movie Review

Before I Fall is written by Lauren Oliver where in 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.

This is the first introductory paragraph of this story which I fell inlove with. I even posted this in my instagram story to share with my followers and friends.

The history of this book on how I got this is during February this year, 2019. I really can’t leave malls without visiting National Bookstore even though most often, I leave National Bookstore without books in my hands. Being a book lover isn’t easy, most especially if you want to buy a book to read before leaving the bookstore but since books are little bit of pricey, you don’t have any choice but to leave the bookstore and just wait that you could earn money to buy the book you want. 

But February 2019 is not an ordinary day for me that time, I have money with me and so I didn’t let that opportunity pass without buying a book in National Bookstore. I was finding a good book to read and buy as I stroll around the piles of books in the shelves of National Bookstore and my hands dropped by on this book. Of course, before buying it, I need to read the description first and scan the first two pages. Upon doing it, this book easily catches my attention so I never hesitated to fall in line in the counter and spend money for this.

And I really didn’t regret buying this because this book never failed me…

To be honest, I have stack of unfinished books I haven’t read yet or not yet done reading and “Before I Fall” became one of those books. I honestly don’t know why I like buying books so much even though, I’ll just stack it in the corner (since I don’t have a book shelf yet). Maybe for book collection and feed my eyes with satisfaction. It makes me happy to see my books growing in quantity and I want to collect some more. As of now, I have nine books in total and I know they’ll still grow more in the future.

“Before I Fall” has 470 pages which honestly took me almost a year before I finish it. It wouldn’t take me that long if I just read the book continuously which I didn’t, by the way. There are times I get lazy and bored in the middle of the chapters and end up closing the book and read it again after weeks. I don’t know why maybe because of Samantha’s thoughts and flashbacks about those people she encounter got me bored because I thought it’s nothing important but little did I know, every details in this book are important in Samantha’s life. Those people she mention in her thoughts have a big impact in her story. I’m glad I didn’t skip those parts even though I am tempted to but as a reader, it’s not really my thing to skip parts no matter how boring it gets because I don’t want to get confused at the end. But without skipping those parts, I am able to know their backgrounds and contributions in Samantha’s life.

This book only revolves in one date – February 12, Cupid Day. I also wonder on how it feels like to relive the last day of your life over and over again without having any idea how you’ll go back in your normal life. It sucks and frustrating, I think. It’s like, you need to relive the day of your death to know the mystery behind it. It actually has an advantage, huh.

In Samantha’s life, as she relive her last day of her life for the whole week, she is always trying to make a change. She experienced kissing the guy who likes her, dumped her boyfriend, ditched a party, she even realtalk her friends. It is such an adventurous week for her before she fall into a deep sleep again and wake up the next day living the same date. It doesn’t matter to her anymore to involve herself in chaos or in anything because she knew that the next day she wake up, nothing will ever change – she will still relive the last day of her life and the people around her will even forget what she did.

At first, I don’t get the flow of the story but as I read further, I’m enjoying every bit of it. There is so much to anticipate in this book and as you read further and further, you can also see yourself getting addicted.

I also love how the author wrote the story. It is very detailed and it’s not confusing. You can easily get what is happening in the story even though without proper description. She also uses terms that can easily understand by young readers and this book is open for everyone at any age. 

After reading this book, I immediately proceeded into watching the movie adaptation of this just to check on how this looks like in a movie. Also as a reader, we would also like to see the story we read and watch it as it turns out to be a movie. And while watching the movie adaptation of Before I Fall, I was just like, “woah!” It’s as good as the book. It’s like my imagination came out and it made as a movie.

In the movie poster of Before I Fall, it was divided into seven parts indicating the seven days of repeatedly living Samantha’s last day in her life.

I wasn’t familiar with the casts they chose to portray the characters but I must say that they portrayed their roles right. I actually don’t trust movie adaptations because it sometimes ruin the reader’s imagination but it’s actually up for a reader if what her imagination looks like. If the movie doesn’t meet your expectation then you must have a different imagination. But as for me, I really liked how they pulled this into a movie. They really met my expectation in a movie and it was shown in the movie just like how I imagine it to be.

You could actually watch Before I Fall even without reading the book. The movie is like the summary of the book, they didn’t missed any important details in the book. But of course, in the book, it is more detailed. While in a movie, you need to stay attentive the whole movie, watch and listen to every words they say so you could understand it more. But all in all, it was shown in the movie just like what was described and written in the book, it’s amazing!

This is not the first time I watched a movie adaptation because I know that when it really comes to American movie adaptations I know that it will never fail me. Just like the Percy Jackson series, they also made it a movie adaptation which I really loved! All I can say is that when it is an American movie adaptation, it will never really fail you. It can even exceed your expectations.

If you also want to watch the movie adaptation of Before I Fall, I can give you a link which was also given by my friend and I also want to share it with you guys. I'll leave it in the comment box and share your thoughts with me!

If you also like to read Before I Fall, I guess this is still available in bookstores or if you can’t see any display of this anymore, you can look for it in website of National Bookstore and you can pre-order it there. 

This is my first book review so thank you for reading! If you have questions, don’t hesitate to comment it below. I am looking forward to review more books in the future and I will all post it in my blog and I hope you guys still read it. 

May God bless us all.