What We Say




What would happen if you were just a kid in a deli and suddenly your nemesis in junior high school, Lisa Bellow, the popular girl who made fun of your weight once but otherwise hasn’t acknowledged your existence, comes in and it’s just the two of you and the deli man? There she is, the popular girl who has a boyfriend (a high schooler, no less!), the girl who you and your friends love to hate. What would you do if soon it was the four of you -- you, the mean girl, the deli guy and a man in a hoodie with a gun? When Lisa Bellow is taken at gunpoint by that man and Meredith Oliver remains frozen in place, head down on the floor where she is told to stay, you might expect the usual story of the police and community in hot pursuit of the perpetrator and his victim. Not this time. “The Fall of Lisa Bellow” isn't your usual exploitative kidnapping tale. In her second novel, award-winning writer Susan Perabo has chosen to turn the spotlight on what happens to those left behind -- to the Oliver family and to Meredith in particular, to their notions of safety and comfort. You might think, “Oh no, not another literary investigation into what happens when bad things happen to good people,” but don’t roll your eyes yet. Perabo has written this one with taste, wisdom, inventiveness and a steady eye. Meredith Oliver come off as real as real can be while she undergoes the torments of her own guilt. And there’s sympathy here for the popular girl who dresses trashy and sticks with her own kind, a person Meredith comes to see and acknowledge in a different way than she had before. In fact, there is plenty of advocacy to go around for everyone in this wise and entertaining novel. – Janet Rotter 
What We Say




What would happen if you were just a kid in a deli and suddenly your nemesis in junior high school, Lisa Bellow, the popular girl who made fun of your weight once but otherwise hasn’t acknowledged your existence, comes in and it’s just the two of you and the deli man? There she is, the popular girl who has a boyfriend (a high schooler, no less!), the girl who you and your friends love to hate. What would you do if soon it was the four of you -- you, the mean girl, the deli guy and a man in a hoodie with a gun? When Lisa Bellow is taken at gunpoint by that man and Meredith Oliver remains frozen in place, head down on the floor where she is told to stay, you might expect the usual story of the police and community in hot pursuit of the perpetrator and his victim. Not this time. “The Fall of Lisa Bellow” isn't your usual exploitative kidnapping tale. In her second novel, award-winning writer Susan Perabo has chosen to turn the spotlight on what happens to those left behind -- to the Oliver family and to Meredith in particular, to their notions of safety and comfort. You might think, “Oh no, not another literary investigation into what happens when bad things happen to good people,” but don’t roll your eyes yet. Perabo has written this one with taste, wisdom, inventiveness and a steady eye. Meredith Oliver come off as real as real can be while she undergoes the torments of her own guilt. And there’s sympathy here for the popular girl who dresses trashy and sticks with her own kind, a person Meredith comes to see and acknowledge in a different way than she had before. In fact, there is plenty of advocacy to go around for everyone in this wise and entertaining novel. – Janet Rotter 
What We Say




What would happen if you were just a kid in a deli and suddenly your nemesis in junior high school, Lisa Bellow, the popular girl who made fun of your weight once but otherwise hasn’t acknowledged your existence, comes in and it’s just the two of you and the deli man? There she is, the popular girl who has a boyfriend (a high schooler, no less!), the girl who you and your friends love to hate. What would you do if soon it was the four of you -- you, the mean girl, the deli guy and a man in a hoodie with a gun? When Lisa Bellow is taken at gunpoint by that man and Meredith Oliver remains frozen in place, head down on the floor where she is told to stay, you might expect the usual story of the police and community in hot pursuit of the perpetrator and his victim. Not this time. “The Fall of Lisa Bellow” isn't your usual exploitative kidnapping tale. In her second novel, award-winning writer Susan Perabo has chosen to turn the spotlight on what happens to those left behind -- to the Oliver family and to Meredith in particular, to their notions of safety and comfort. You might think, “Oh no, not another literary investigation into what happens when bad things happen to good people,” but don’t roll your eyes yet. Perabo has written this one with taste, wisdom, inventiveness and a steady eye. Meredith Oliver come off as real as real can be while she undergoes the torments of her own guilt. And there’s sympathy here for the popular girl who dresses trashy and sticks with her own kind, a person Meredith comes to see and acknowledge in a different way than she had before. In fact, there is plenty of advocacy to go around for everyone in this wise and entertaining novel. – Janet Rotter 
What We Say




What would happen if you were just a kid in a deli and suddenly your nemesis in junior high school, Lisa Bellow, the popular girl who made fun of your weight once but otherwise hasn’t acknowledged your existence, comes in and it’s just the two of you and the deli man? There she is, the popular girl who has a boyfriend (a high schooler, no less!), the girl who you and your friends love to hate. What would you do if soon it was the four of you -- you, the mean girl, the deli guy and a man in a hoodie with a gun? When Lisa Bellow is taken at gunpoint by that man and Meredith Oliver remains frozen in place, head down on the floor where she is told to stay, you might expect the usual story of the police and community in hot pursuit of the perpetrator and his victim. Not this time. “The Fall of Lisa Bellow” isn't your usual exploitative kidnapping tale. In her second novel, award-winning writer Susan Perabo has chosen to turn the spotlight on what happens to those left behind -- to the Oliver family and to Meredith in particular, to their notions of safety and comfort. You might think, “Oh no, not another literary investigation into what happens when bad things happen to good people,” but don’t roll your eyes yet. Perabo has written this one with taste, wisdom, inventiveness and a steady eye. Meredith Oliver come off as real as real can be while she undergoes the torments of her own guilt. And there’s sympathy here for the popular girl who dresses trashy and sticks with her own kind, a person Meredith comes to see and acknowledge in a different way than she had before. In fact, there is plenty of advocacy to go around for everyone in this wise and entertaining novel. – Janet Rotter

At first I was confused on the genre of this novel and wasn't sure if it was literary fiction or YA.  I tried to sit back and enjoy the story regardless of my confusion and easily got sucked into a story about the teenage survivor of a sandwich shop robbery in which the most popular girl at school was kidnapped.  I felt propelled to read to the end to figure out what happened and really did enjoy reading this book.  I read this book prior to its publication, thanks to NetGalley, so the percentage read kept increasing on my Kindle without me feeling like anything happened to move things forward or wrap things up.  Finally, I got to 99%, 3 min left with absolutely no resolution.  While I enjoyed actually reading this book, the ending pretty much ruined it.  I don't need my endings neatly wrapped up in a bow, and often prefer them not to be, but this one fell off a cliff (as the title suggests).  I'm grateful for the opportunity to read it early, but was not a fan.

<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30753832-the-fall-of-lisa-bellow" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img border="0" alt="The Fall of Lisa Bellow" src="https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1467551841m/30753832.jpg" /></a><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30753832-the-fall-of-lisa-bellow">The Fall of Lisa Bellow</a> by <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/164672.Susan_Perabo">Susan Perabo</a><br/>
My rating: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1761781327">3 of 5 stars</a><br /><br />
This is the story of a family that has experienced tragedy. The parents are both dentists, they have a high school aged son, who has lost one of his eyes during a freak accident playing baseball (I loved this character) and a middle school age, unpopular daughter who is a victim of a deli robbery in which a fellow student is taken by the robber.<br />This book deals with issues the whole family has, especially the daughter and how she is dealing with the post traumatic event. <br /><br />Thank you to NetGalley, Simon & Schuster, and author Susan Perabo for the advanced reader's edition.
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/12851291-karen">View all my reviews</a>

A truly thought provoking story of a young woman who experiences a traumatic event and her journey for understanding. I really enjoyed this story!

So many novels follow the girl taken or the police officer charged with finding her. Instead this story follows the girl not taken, Meredith. After witnessing a robbery and the kidnapping of the most popular mean girl in school, Meredith goes home to deal with her personal aftermath. Meanwhile, her mother Claire is trying to cope with not only the almost kidnapping of her daughter but also the loss of her son's sight in one eye and the end of his dream to be a baseball player along with her own unrest with her marriage. While at some points I felt like the book was trying to take on too many issues, I'll admit I enjoyed both points of view and came to feel that they did a great job of balancing each other out. I also really liked that Ms. Perabo did not end the book with a nice tidy bow.

This novel was one I had been highly anticipating since late last year, and unfortunately, it just wasn’t for me. I’ve read a number of character driven novels in the past couple of months and I think I’m just getting a bit sick of them. Because of this, my review is going to be skewed, there’s no way around that, it just wasn’t the kind of novel I was hoping to read at this point in my reading journey.

The novel was very well put together. The writing was wonderful and the characters were incredibly well developed, but my problem was the plot. As a lot of others have said, this promised suspense and a bit of action, but it was instead a slow moving, poetic family drama.

The characters, I didn’t care enough about to really get invested in their stories. Meredith was fine, and like I previously said, often funny, but I had no empathy for her, so her story meant very little to me. Claire I didn’t like, not even a little bit. I’ve never experienced motherhood, but there was something so immature about her when it came to certain situations with her kids, that I ended up hating her for her behaviour and thoughts.

I hate that I didn’t like this novel, but there we are.

Thanks to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster for giving me the opportunity to read this in exchange for an honest review.

How does one live through a tragedy? Who do they become in the aftermath? This is the main story line in this complex, tragic yet hopeful novel. It is not a light read, it is deep and profound but so worth the read.

This book was an extremely memorable thriller that took me by surprise, because it's something that was unlike anything that I’ve read before. The thing that I enjoyed most is the psychological study of human beings and the interaction and nuances in relationships between parent and child and how that in turn affects the worldview of all of the characters. Character study, if I can call it that is one of the most fascinating things that can be explored in any novels, and so I really appreciated what the author did here.

We follow Meredith, a young child who has experienced a traumatic kidnapping incident, where she was left behind. This changes the core of her being, and messes with her head as well as her mother's and those around here. This book deals with the aftermath and survival guilt after Lisa Bellow's disappearance, as well as  with flashbacks from earlier times describing what Lisa was really like.

I've read a couple of stories like this, where something happens to a someones that the MC hated, and then after something big happens they suddenly become obsessed with everything about them. When in reality, they maybe took five minutes to talk to them in their whole lifetime, so it sometimes seems pointless to be so concerned about the outcome of their fate. This book was by far the best example that I could recommend to people about this concept.

I really felt like I could relate to thirteen-year old Meredith, even though I’ve never attended public middle school, and even though I’ve never had to face a struggle like this. The author just makes you want to empathize and connect with both the main characters . 

If I'm honest, although I adore multiple POVs books, they are rarely done right. I was so glad that each of the character's were so distinct and unique, so that I could easily differentiate between our family cast. The transition was seamless, because from the tone I immediately knew that a shift had occurred. 

My only bump in the road was at the beginning of Book 2, because I personally extremely confused at what was doing on. At first I thought that this dual plot thing was unique before I figured it out at the very end. Even though there was no clear resolution at the ending, I still felt satisfied. I can understand how this might bother some people, that there is no clear "yes" or "no" answer. In fact I didn't even realize that fact under I looked back on this unputdownable book.

**<i>Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a copy in exchange for my honest review. All opinions are my own</i>

After awkward teen Meredith witnesses the kidnapping of cruel, popular Lisa Bellow, both she , her family and her entire community must deal with the aftermath.

This book is an interesting exploration of adolescence and PTSD.  Meredith is profoundly affected by the robbery and Lisa's disappearance.  She not only has to confront the violence of the robbery and kidnapping, but her conflicted feelings about Lisa, who had been mean to her in the past.  She also finds herself thrust into a new social sphere as Lisa's friends need answers about her disappearance.

The book deals with Meredith and her mother, Claire.   Both perspectives are very realistic.  The author really nails adolescence and middle age in a very real way.  I have a lot in common with 13 year old Meredith, she comes across as a real person, not a generic teen. Claire also has a lot of her own issues, that seem very true to life.  She's not a goody two shoes perfect mom.  She was a very interesting character.

This book's strengths are the characters and their relationships.  The plot gets a little convoluted about halfway through, but I was satisfied with the overall explanation and  ending.

Decent and well thought out focusing on not neccesarily the real victim but still a victim of sorts. Refreshing and original.

I did enjoy this book, but even after finishing it, struggled with how it was presented by the publisher, and how it read. 
This book might seem to be about two girls who are abducted. It might seem to be a "thriller" or "suspenseful" but it's really not. Yes, there is an abduction, but it's really about relationships, and a family who is falling apart trying to get through a traumatic event, even two events. 
The wounded mind, the tricks it plays not only on the victim, but with us, the readers, is tragic. 
Overall I thought the book good, the writing well done, with a lot of it seeming to be dialogue. It was a quick read, and held my attention.

Lastly I will say what definitely annoyed me about this story, and I just couldn't get my head around was that the whole world these children lived in. Middle school? I'm certainly out of the loop if this is how middle school girls behave and experience their lives. 

Thanks to Simon & Schuster who provided me an e-copy of this book prior to publication via NetGalley for an honest review.

I'm a little disappointed in this book. I guess I went in thinking it was going to be one thing and got something else.
It was just okay, not outstanding. I couldn't really feel anything for any of the characters. The robbery was under whelming as was the kidnapping. It seems like the Oliver family was living under a dark cloud. Mark and Evan where the only two non Eyeore type people. I realize that Meredith suffered a trauma, but It just wasn't presented as very traumatic.
 In the end it was luke warm to me.

I will still recommend this book to patrons but I found the tone of this book to be awfully whiny and irritating making it a tedious read.

This will go live on my blog on March 10. Kellyvision.wordpress.com

Meredith and her nemesis, Lisa Bellow, are both at a Wawa-style convenience store when it's robbed. The armed robber takes Lisa with him, leaving Meredith behind. 

This is such an interesting book but first a caveat: there is no resolution. We don't know what happened to Lisa. And we don't know for sure that Meredith will ever be OK again. 

I loved this book. I think it'd be easy for other people to not love it (lack of resolution; weird aspects of the plot) but if you're comfortable with ambiguity, this is totally the book for you. 

Recommended.

This book is so much more than a story about a kidnapping. It is about a family and how they cope with tragedy. It is also about relationships and girls coming of age (I really enjoyed the middle school 'drama').   I don't think this was a very suspenseful story - the suspense piece of it was always there but feels secondary.  This is one of those books I was fully invested in and likely to continue thinking about after.  Strong character development and overall an entertaining, well written novel. I would not necessarily recommend this title to those looking for a thriller/mystery/psych. thriller - but definitely will recommend for anyone looking for a contemporary fiction.

I received and read "The Fall of Lisa Bellow" through Netgalley and I appreciate the opportunity to review.   Sometimes you run across a book that is just a miss for you and I guess this was a miss for me.   Teenager Meredith Oliver is one of those kids who has a little trouble fitting in at school.  Lisa Bellow is the IT girl at the same school.  One day after school the girls find themselves in a sandwich shop when an armed gunman enters the shop and Lisa Bellow is kidnapped.   The book revolves around Meredith and her family and their response to the tragedy.   Some of the characters are likable, and some are not and I guess because I didn't connect with Meredith or her mother, the book was a bit of a struggle for me.   It reminded me of the movie "Ordinary People".

This book had a lot of potential. I thought the characters were well thought out, the storyline was interesting, and the writing was on point. I think had I gone into this one with the expectations of it being a thriller, I would have been disappointed.  It is not fast paced and certainly not a whodunit type book. I found the story to be a bit convoluted. As I got towards the middle, I started wondering what was actually going on. It was very clear that Meredith was creating this imaginary world, until all of a sudden it wasn't clear. From that point on, I wasn't sure what was going on and I lost interest. I think if the story had been cleaned up, it would have been more successful.

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. I lived this book. Kept me up all night reading. Highly recommended!

This book is about an abduction and kidnapping of a teenage girl while in the presence  of another teenage girl who is left behind and the downward spiral of the left behind girls family.  The author did a marvelous job of enabling the family to cope with the guilt of being the "safe ones" while  also being able to work through the many confused and angry feelings.  It is a powerful story that involves such a mixed bag of emotions from everyone.  It truly shows that the support of family and the resilience of the human spirit is a strong and wonderful thing.