Before the Fall
Ratings100
Average rating3.7
★★ out of 5 stars at spikegelato.com/2016/06/25/review-before-the-fall/
A private plane leaving Martha's Vineyard crashes under mysterious circumstances. The backstory of each passenger is chronicled, while also telling the story of the two survivors.
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.
For a novel generating a lot of summer buzz, this was a bit of a letdown. “THE thriller of the year” the description proclaims. In my eyes, I wouldn't even describe it as a thriller, but more of a plodding mystery novel. Providing such deep backstories on each plane passenger would've been a more compelling tool if hints or red herrings had been dropped about why each person might seek to crash the plane. Without this, the time spent on the backstories seems wasted, especially once you find out the true reason for the plane crash. All of this is sandwiched between Hawley's attempt at telling a deeper story about the pitfalls of the 24-hour news cycle and why wild public speculation can be counterproductive. In a way, it accomplished that, but it did so at the expense of weaving a compelling mystery tale.
★ ★ ★ 1/2 (rounded up)
This originally appeared at The Irresponsible Reader.
—
A small, but luxurious, private plane goes down between Martha's Vineyard and New York – two passengers survive, a painter (a guest of one of the other passengers) and a 4-year old boy. The boy is the son of two of the passengers – a man who runs a FOXNews doppleganger and his wife. The painter is a recovering addict named Scott Burroughs who's on the verge of his big break. Thanks to a childhood obsession with swimming, Scott is able to swim he and the boy to safety – catapulting them both into a level of celebrity that nobody wants.
The investigation into the plane crash begins even before Scott makes it to shore – and looks into the background of everyone on the plane to find the responsible party. As the investigation – and the narration – gets into their pasts, it's easy to believe that many of the people on board are responsible for the tragedy (either as perpetrator or target).
The other primary storyline follows the lives of Scott and the boy in the days following the crash. Their lives are forever changed – and intertwined. This was the heart of the book – by far the best part of it, while there was no suspense, no danger, just picking up the pieces of their life while under intense and unwanted media scrutiny.
The commentary this novel makes about the role of the Twenty-Four News Cycle in commenting on, shaping, and twisting whatever story it chooses to focus on needs to be heard. On the one hand, it's nothing that many haven't said before, but the way Hawley says it should help his message to resonate with people.
I read Hawley's first novel, A Conspiracy of Tall Men, when it was first released and it blew me away – and I lost track of him after that until his show, The Unusuals premiered (still annoyed with ABC for canceling that too soon). This book has convinced me that I need to go back and read the books I missed – this isn't as good as his debut, but it's easier to believe. Hawley has a great way of getting into his character's heads – and bringing the reader with him. These are all clearly drawn individuals with intricate and distinct backstories and voices, throw in an equally intricate plot that kept me gripped (even after I stopped really caring about “how did it happen” – I'm not sure that makes sense).
Petkoff's narration is pretty good – he's able to keep the story moving and deliver convincing characters (although I'm not crazy about his kid-voice, thankfully, he didn't have to use it often). Petkoff's a name that I'll keep an eye out for.
A novel with two (main) stories – one that's really good, and another that's ultimately disappointing, while gripping up until that point. Hawley delivered here, and I look forward to reading more of his work (almost as much as I look forward to another season of his TV work). I recommend this – either in text or audio – it won't be the best thing you read, but it'll reward the time.
I was torn between three and four stars for this. I enjoyed the book but found the story to ebb and flow, and ultimately many of the details didn't pertain to the story.
I loved the premise of this book. The writing was good and the characters were interesting, but the execution of the story was mediocre. I didn't find any real tension building throughout the book and the ending was disappointing. There were so many exciting threads that could have been followed and tied together in the end. Not a bad read, but just not as good as it could have been.
Interesting approach in that you know the ending up front involving the plane crash and have to read on to find out what exactly led to the crash. You get information about each of the survivors and victims before and leading up to the crash, which in some ways is something I've wondered about when tragedies happen. Who were the people involved? What were their last thoughts? What kind of people were they? Grasping for humanity in the midst of death and something so terrible. Wanting to find out these answers and what happened kept me reading, but I have to say the ending felt rushed and somehow not worth all that led up to it.
It was an entertaining read, but Hawley's writing isn't quite my style, so I'm not likely to read any of his other works. I got this book through Book of the Month and will happily pass this book on to someone else looking for an easy but interesting read.
Just finished reading the 2017 Edgar Award for Best Novel and this was a good one!
Not thrilled. Literally the slowest thriller I've ever read and super predictable. I don't get it.
Amazing, brilliant, character-driven commentary on the perversion of reality in modern life and the 24 hour news cycle.
Listened to this one in the car. Fairly gripping tale of the lives of the passengers on a doomed flight.
I'm not gonna say these two things are connected or anything ... but this is a light mystery/thriller about a plane that crashes with a lot of rich people on board. One of the only two survivors is a dude who paints disaster scenes for a (kind of) living. And just when I was finishing up this audiobook during a quick walk this evening, the sky opened up and rain poured down on me while I was a mile from home. DISASTER!
But in all seriousness, I really, really enjoyed this book and the narrator was an excellent match with the material. It was suspenseful without being too on-the-edge-of-your-seat, you get to see the points of view of all the characters, there are people being terrible and breaking laws for no good reason, and it wrapped up nicely enough so that I wasn't shouting at my phone at the end. A good summer read.