Readers Place

What We Think

Nina Douglas, Random House Children’s Books Publicity, on Before I Die:

Before I Die by Jenny Downham is one of those books that simply won’t leave you – from the moment that you turn the first page Tessa has you hooked.

This book doesn’t withhold any emotional punches – from the outset you know that this is a life and death situation, where the end is inevitable, but it is the journey that is so very important. The voice of Tessa comes across as real, strong and true: a teen facing the thought that this time and these moments are really all she will ever have – there won’t be a future with her understanding, supportive boy next door, or children like her best friend who has found herself in the position of being a pregnant teenager, alone and scared. It is the characters of Tessa’s immediate family: her frustrated, desperate father, her flaky mother, her younger brother who loves and hates her with equal and honest ferocity and her boyfriend and best friend that provide the moving and colourful life enhancing backdrop to Tessa’s wish list of things to experience before her time runs out.

Before I Die may make you cry (few who have read it have managed to read the whole book without), but it will also make you angry, make you laugh and make you feel inspired to really live your life and experience all that you can. This may be a book about a subject that few could write well about, but here Jenny has more than succeeded and it is a story written with such intensity and humour that it ultimately becomes an important book about life and living: a life affirming novel, not a book about dying.

I personally can’t recommend Before I Die highly enough – read with a tissue to hand, and possibly not on public transport (as so many of us did before we knew just what this book could do!).