Before I Fall | Book Review

Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This was my immediate reaction after finishing this book:

I LOVE it and I HATE it when I read a book that makes me depressed because I'll never write anything THAT amazing probably ever. Ugh. Before I Fall is Mean Girls meets Groundhog's Day. Or Daybreak if Taye Diggs's character had been Gretchen Wieners. Every single teen issue is addressed the story. ALL OF THEM. There is character development GALORE. And it made me cry just a tiny bit. And I'm freaking angry that I can't know more about What Happens After. I hate you, Lauren Oliver, for being so dang good at words. I hate you and I love you to death. And even then.

Honestly, I think that's says everything you need to know about my feelings. Here's the Rating Breakdown:

Writing technique: ★★★★1/2 Oliver makes magic out of words. She's compelling and intriguing. She makes you like pretty loathsome characters. She makes them relatable, loveable even. Her descriptions are perfection. She uses the a shallow, vain, self-absorbed girl to raise interesting questions, say thought-provoking things. A tiny example:

“I shiver, thinking how easy it is to be totally wrong about people-to see one tiny part of them and confuse it for the whole, to see the cause and think it's the effect or vice versa."

Character development:★★★★★ Sam's transformation is so real and believable and awesome. I also got to see into a lot of the other characters in a way that was really moving. I thought I'd have difficulty sympathizing with a Mean Girl, but I loved Sam. A lot.

Plot/Story development: ★★★★1/2 Unlike Bill Murray's character who relives Groundhog's Day potentially millions of times, Sam relives her last day only 7 times. I thought the days would be a predictable repetition of the same events day by day, but I was pleasantly surprised. Sam makes significantly different choices that lead to entirely different days and a brilliantly unfolding plot. So good.

Message/Theme: ★★★★1/2 OMG, Oliver delves into practically every teen issue fearlessly: popularity, peer pressure, snobbery, teen sex, teen drinking, drinking and driving, alcoholism, divorce, family drama, friend drama, leading v. following, bullying, drug abuse, suicide, depression, eating disorders, student-teacher romance, senioritis, vanity, greed, lying, cheating, and probably more. Oliver's message is essentially this: how you live matters, how you treat people deeply affects them, the world doesn't revolve around you, and when you die, will you be remembered for something good? You don't know what moment will be your last.
 
Audiobook Narration: ★★★★ Sarah Drew read this audiobook and she did fantastically. When I looked her up, I was shocked to realize she was the most detestable character ever on Grey's Anatomy (one of my favorite shows). I appreciated her as an actor far more for her work on this novel than anything I've witnessed on that show. She made me laugh out loud literally. She made me love Sam and Lindsay and Anna and Juliet. She only loses a point for her "Kent" voice which I'm not sure did him justice, and her "Rob" voice which always sounded stoned.

Overall: ★★★★★ INCREDIBLE BOOK. I wish everyone would read it. Seriously.



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I Do Not Belong To You | Original Song + The Story

A few weeks ago, I heard a message from my buddy Nate on the prophet Daniel that really got to me. A lifetime of Sunday School and Vacation Bible School has ensured that today I know the stories of Daniel In The Lions' Den and Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego In The Fiery Furnace very very well. It's easy to think that there's nothing new I could hear about these old Bible heroes that I haven't heard before. But there I was on a Sunday night learning something brand new.

So Daniel chapter 1 explains how Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah were Jewish captives taken to the land of Babylon by King Nebuchadnezzar. And as part of their assimilation into Babylonian culture, they were given new clothes to wear, new palace food and wine to consume, a new place to live. They were taught the literature and language of the Chaldeans. And they were given new names. These names (Belteshazzar, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego) were linked with Babylonian deities and were used to substitute the names they had which linked them with the God of Israel.

Everything they experienced was designed to make them conform to the society around them, to become Babylonians. To forget their home, their heritage, their beliefs, their God. They wanted it to affect them not just on the outside but on the inside as well. They wanted to change not just their appearance, but their habits and their identity also. All they had to do was change the way these Israelites thought about themselves.

But these four men didn't cave. Verse 8 says:

"But Daniel resolved that he would not defile himself with the king's food, or with the wine that he drank." 

He and his three friends separated themselves from the others not just in their diet. They wore new clothes and were called pagan names, but they didn't compromise. They followed God. Later Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah would be thrown into a fiery furnace for not bowing down to and worshiping an idol, and Daniel would be thrown into a lions' den for praying to his God. The law said they had to live like Babylonians - particularly in worship. But these men stood strong. They obeyed God. They were willing even to die for their faith. And of course, we know, they all miraculously survived. Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah go into a furnace so hot it killed the men that threw them in, and they didn't burn up. (To hear a great song about the fiery furnace story, listen to this.) And God shut the mouths of the lions when Daniel was thrown into their den. God protected his followers because they were faithful. They put their identity in the One True God.

Today, our world does this same thing to us. Media, books, movies, music - they all have this message to be like them. To sell ourselves out for the Great American Dream. To be greedy. To be hateful. To be lustful. To be cruel. To be liars, cheaters, adulterers, thieves, murderers, and idolaters. To compromise. To find our identity in success, in public opinion, in art, in nature, in academia, in medication, in individuality, in marriage, in sex, in family, in friends, in possessions, in music, in politics, in culture, in ourselves, in our own greatness. But God says the opposite.

So consider this my anthem. I will not be dictated to by culture. I won't cave, conform, or compromise. I do not belong to you, world. I belong to Jesus.

I Do Not Belong To You.m4a
  

I Do Not Belong To You
Music and Lyrics by Dana J. Moore

Change my name; paint my face
Bring me wine sweet to my taste
Give me coins, show me power
Threaten me; I will not cower

You do not define me
Mold me and refine me
You constantly remind me
I do not belong to you

Dress me up; push me around
For you, these knees will never touch the ground
Strip me bare; peel my skin
You cannot scratch the soul within

You will not defile me
Ravage and revile me
Your ways aren't so beguiling
I do not belong to you

Set the fire, toss me in
I will not bow; I won't give in
Find a pit; throw me down
I'll sleep with lions and still won't bow

Bind my hands; chain my feet
I don't surrender; I don't retreat
I'm prepared to pay the cost
Nail me backwards to a cross

I do not belong to you...

Come use and abuse me
You may execute me
Hang, behead, or shoot me
I do not belong to you