Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

A Life can end at any moment, death is an unpleasant surprise to any it faces. Whether a person deserves it or not is a question we will never know the answer to. The novel “Before I Fall” by Lauren Oliver, provides insight on the character development of Samantha kingston as she battles the urge to be like everyone else or if she is to make a difference in her life. “Before I Fall” sheds light on the development of Samantha Kingston and how she changes for the better throughout the story.

Samantha Kingston starts out in the novel as an obnoxious teen who only cares about the well being of herself and friends. Samantha does not acknowledge Juliet Sykes’s feelings and by making fun of her with others, she is damaging Juliet’s self esteem. “Juliet stumbles my way, half drenched arms outstretched, trying to get her balance, I grab a half-finished beer from the window sill and dump it on her.” pg.70. Samantha does not realize the damage she is doing, not only to Juliet but also herself. By constantly teasing everyone and thinking she is better than most, she damages the self esteem of many. Samantha has created a bad reputation for herself and now has limited her ability to be kind to others by always teasing everyone she feels is below her. Sam starts off as a very self involved hateful teen that does not care for others but merely herself and her close friends.

After constant efforts made by Sam to reverse the day of her death, she starts to believe that she can do as she pleases without any consequences. Samantha steals her mother's credit card and spends it as she pleases without thinking twice of the effects it could have on others. “I fish out the Amex carefully. My parents only use it for major purchases so there’s no way my mom will notice it’s missing.” pg 229. Samantha is careless and only cares about herself, she lies, steals and is rude to the people that care about her the most. At this point in the chapter Samantha has given up on trying to reverse the day of her death and get her life back, she thinks that whatever she does will not have any consequences, but truthfully every action has a consequence and Samantha learns this the hard way. From her previous actions of lying and stealing, she faces yet again another day of reliving her death. Any action or choice made will always affect more than one person, Sam realizes this when she acknowledges the actions she made while lying and stealing.

Samantha tries to apologize to Juliet for the way she has treated her and tries everything she can to help