After falling completely in love with ASPEN, I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to read another book by Rebekah Crane. I even own a copy of THE ODDS OF LOVING GROVER CLEVELAND but it got lost in the shuffle while moving. (To be clear: I didn’t actually lose it, but I know it got boxed up at my dad’s house for now.) I was eager to read THE UPSIDE OF FALLING DOWN because it’s a very Lauren book. Sometimes amnesia books can be too cliched and people avoid them, but I’m not sick of them yet.

When Clementine wakes up in a hospital in Ireland, she doesn’t remember anything about herself. She was involved in a plane crash and it’s a miracle she’s even alive. Overwhelmed by her lack of memories, she sneaks out of the hospital and settles in the Irish countryside with a boy she meets there. (Poor decision-making skills, I know.) She avoids her real life and the fact that her dad is looking for her because she’s upset she doesn’t remember anything. I liked Kieran a lot even though he was cold and distant at first. The romance felt a little sudden or forced almost, and was often cheesy, but I grew to like them by the end.

I’ve never been to Ireland or really cared about going (compared to other countries around there), but this book made me second guess that. This book was a really quick read but the second half was even more addicting; I could just feel that things would come to a head soon. There were a lot of secrets and discoveries that clicked together that I LOVED and the ending of the book was wonderfully surprising.

I received this ARC copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review

Actual rating: 3.5 stars

“Dare accepted,” he says.

After reading The Darkest Minds Trilogy and having my emotion wrecked, The Upside of Falling Down definitely helped to brighten up my mood. This story was as I expected a cute and fluffy quick read!

I can tell Rebekah Crane had been to Ireland because even though I have never been there, she described all the places vividly and I can basically picture them in my mind. As for the story, it is about the lone survivor of a plane crash who lost her memories and her journey of self-discovery. Clementine is unsure if she wants to remember her past self or just to start a new life in Ireland. She meets this handsome Irish guy and the adventure starts from there!

I have some issues with Clementine’s personality but the biggest issue I had was the fact that she left her father alone in Ireland behind for a month! Her father came all the way from home to pick his only daughter up and she just selfishly left him behind without a word. I get it. I get it. She lost all her memories, was scared to meet her father that she did not remember, and she wanted to try to recover her memories in her own way by escaping with Kieran. But she could have just talked to him and I’m sure he would have understood her decision. I also think that if she met her father early on, she would have recovered her memories faster because of what happened in the end… but I guess we would not have a book if that was a case.

The ending was not what I expected and surprised me but I have to say the moment she starts having these dreams, I kind of predicted the ending. But it was still good!

Thank you so much to NetGalley and the publisher for giving me this ARC! It was an amazing read!

Unfortunately I didn't finish this book, as I couldn't get into it - nothing against the author or book, just not to my personal taste. Thank you for the opportunity to read it.

I love books with foreign places at its epicenter. Loved seeing Ireland through Clementine/Jane's eyes. Want to go to Ireland now.

TUoFD had a promising start with a protagonist facing temporary amnesia after surviving a plane crash.

It got lost on me with the romantic feature of this book. Also with the way Jane remembered everything. It was realistic but seemed rushed still.

I was expecting a more cutesy contemporary that made me happy and which was fun. This was slightly fun but not really up my alley.

Special thanks to NetGalley and the Publishers for this review copy.

Well, this was... something.

This is the story of Clementine Haas and how she was reborn. She wakes up in a hospital in Ireland, with no idea of who she is and how she got there. They say she survived an plane crash, that she's a miracle, but how can that be, when she's completely lost? It feels more like a nightmare to her. She can't remember anything, not her dad, who's on his way to get her back home, not her name, nothing. But the sound of going back, to a life that doesn't feel like hers, is worse than having no recollection of what happened to her, so she manages to convince an Irish guy to take her away without telling her who she was and what happened to her. She needs time to figure out who she is, and she can't do that in a hospital, even less on a plane back home. So the lies she tells Kieran are justified, right? Except her guilt starts eating her up, when she realizes she's falling for him. What would he say if he knew the truth? Would he take her back? She can't put that to test, not until she finds herself.

When I first read the blurb it sounded really, really good, like something I would like. A girl with amnesia, a cute guy, a cottage in Ireland… yeah, it sounds GOOD. It had all the potential for a great story, but it didn't really meet my expectations. At times it felt unbelievable and unrealistic, and it just made me lose my interest the more I read.

At first, I was looking forward in seeing how everything would go, how she would find herself and get around who she once was and who she is now, and ultimately find a way to live with both sides of her. It can’t be easy to lose your memories, everything you once knew, and add waking up in another country to that, yeah… it must be completely terrifying. This is definitely a new chance in life, and we can’t say no to second chances, right? The thing was that, it felt like there were too many scattered things, like, the more you read, the more questions came up and nothing got answered.

Yes, it's a cute story, but there just were things I couldn't get my mind around of. We’re given close to nothing when it comes to certain information. Her memories are gone, yes, but nothing was adding up or leading up to something real. Also, I couldn't really feel the chemistry between Clementine and Kieran. It felt like there wasn't very much to grasp from, their conversations were kind of dull and lacking something, maybe some kind of depth. It's hard to fall for someone when you know absolutely nothing about him, and that's what it felt like for me with Kieran. He gave way too little for me to actually feel something for him. So, when the love actually came, it felt way too forced and awkward.

If I'm being honest, the whole narrative focused on meaningless things of the story and it didn't feel like it was growing or adding to it. It felt stuck, and I guess that's kind of the issue with Clementine, she's stuck, but I couldn’t see her development as the story grew. She acted the same way from the beginning to the end.

I believe both characters had the potential to become something awesome. The story itself had the potential to be something I would love, but it was lacking something for me. I loved that it was set in Ireland. I think it's such a romantic setting... but other than that, I couldn't really connect with it.

The upside of falling down is a book about identity and finding yourself. Clementine Haas finds herself waking up in a hospital in a foreign country with no memory after she was the only living person that was rescued from a plane crash. With the feeling of her memory never returning she sets out to discover herself and find out who she really is.
I enjoyed this book I thought it was well thought out but it was predictable. The twists in story I figured out early on, the main character was rather aggravating at times so it decreased my rating along with some unnecessary cringe worthy moments is why I rated this 3 stars.

I was lucky to stumble upon Crane's last book, The Odds of Loving Grover Cleveland, last year, and enjoyed it immensely. Therefore, when I saw The Upside of Falling Down, I knew right away, that I had to read it, and you know what? It was utterly delightful!

"It's the upside of falling down," Kieran says. "It's why you jump in the first place...for that moment."

•Pro: The whole theme of the book is fabulous! It's about new beginnings and possibilities. Clementine's amnesia freed her from her past, and it was so wonderful being there with her as she tried to figure out who she was and who she wanted to be.

•Pro: I really enjoyed getting to know the people who became Clementine's inner circle. They were a very colorful group of characters, who were quite layered, and I really appreciated what they brought to the story. Clive and Stephen both won me over with their big, beautiful hearts!

•Pro: Kieran was a complicated guy. He was dealing with his own crisis, as he struggled with who he wanted to be and who his father wanted him to be. The Kieran I loved, was the one we saw when he temporarily left those worries for another day. He was very sweet, doting, generous, and very dedicated to those he loved. I was really pleased when we got to the bottom of his issues.

•Pro: I loved being in Clementine's head. There was so much going on in there, and some of her reflections were quite amusing.

•Pro: Though this book explores some weighty topics, it stays on the lighter side.

•Pro: I thought it was great the way Crane slowly revealed Clementine's memories, because it lead to a rather BIG twist, which I didn't see coming until it was more or less upon us.

•Pro: I adored the setting! I visited Ireland back in 2007, and Crane brought me back to all those lovely places I had visited.

•Pro: The ending left me with a perma-smile, so I would say it was pretty solid.

Overall: I utterly adored this book! The fabulous characters combine with the delightful setting, the sweet romance, and endless possibilities left me with a big stupid grin on my face. File it under "makes-me-happy".

I have always had dreams of visiting Ireland one day. I love stories set there, and while the main portion of this story takes place in Ireland, the most compelling part of the story for me ended up being the characters.

The two main characters, Clementine and Kieran were both amazing. Clementine was really bold (sometimes to the point of over-stepping social boundaries) and, after the first little bit of awkwardness, Kieran was everything you could want in a male lead. There was great strength and depth in both characters, but even so, both were very close to being eclipsed by the supporting cast. Stephen, Clive, and even Siobhan each in their own way help Clementine get to the root of who she is inside.

Because this is a story about a girl who has lost her memories, her family relationships were not really explored, but at the end, once you find out about the twist, you can look back and see indicators throughout the story. Also, that twist? I was not expecting it and it helped to solve many of my feelings and the questions that had been plaguing me, so, 'Bravo, Ms. Crane.'

I had a lot of fun reading The Upside of Falling Down. Thank you for this entertaining story about a girl who needed to lose herself before she could begin to find herself.

A positively epic read. I was sucked into these pages and I fell hard for these characters. Clementine is so inspiring. Her journey to move past her tragedy and her great heart will warm your insides. She’s a survivor, dealing with unfathomable circumstances. All of these amazing people will keep you vested and addicted to these pages.

I’m a hard core Rebekah fan and this solidifies my love for her work. These words will inspire you and help you feel that even when faced with some of the worst circumstances life can throw our way there is a light on the other side. Running and hiding only helps for so long then life, loss and remembering takes hold and changes who we were meant to be.

Clem is a glass half full type of girl and Kieran will shock you. A wonderful ride, a fantastic read with beautiful words and imagery.

https://bookstalebyme.wordpress.com/2018/01/07/the-upside-of-falling-down-arc-review/

A girl whose memories are lost after a plane crash and the boy trying to find his own purpose fall in love amidst the charming Irish setting in Rebekah Crane’s THE UPSIDE OF FALLING DOWN.

Clementine Haas wakes in an Irish hospital to find that she’s the only survivor in a plane crash with no recollection of who she is. On impulse she convinces a sweet Irish guy, who she told her name was Jane, she met in the courtyard at the hospital to help her escape, by telling him that she was mugged and wants to leave and start a new life. He takes her back to the small cottage he shares with his prickly and pregnant twin sister, Siobhan. Clementine’s guilt over lying to Kieran begins to weigh on her as she starts to fall for him. But something keeps Kieran from reciprocating romantic feelings.

This book has a lot of cute in it but deals with some tough issues. How terrifying would it be to wake up in another country with no idea how you got where you are or who you you? Finding your identity and who you are is hard enough as a teenager without adding in the complexities of amnesia. That’s the unique part about this book. She has to find out who she is all over again while trying to gasp bits of her past and combine it with all the new things she experiences.

Meanwhile, Kieran has his own identity crisis. His father has controlled him and Siobhan with threats and a lot of money. Until now, Kieran has always caved until the stern finger of his father but personal tragedy has left him shaken and on the cusp of something new, scary, and maybe even good.

Throughout the story, Clementine remembers bits and pieces of the girl she used to be, putting together a puzzle of her past. All of this was a good mystery that kept me reading, wondering how Ireland ties into all of this. There is an Irish boy from her past. Could it be Kieran? Is it someone else?

This novel is very high in concept. A plot such as this is something that sounds really intriguing in a synopsis. While I did like the book, I would have liked it so much more if there was a little more believability to it. The fact that a hospital patient with amnesia was able to escape from a hospital and remain lost despite being all over the national news was a little far-fetched. The love story was cute but it felt like it needed more foundation. The multiple coincidences revealed towards the end just added to the unbelievability and I felt disconnected from the story because of this.

Some mysteries are good, but this one isn't really all that interesting. It felt slow and a little boring. I wasn't really wanting to find out about the main character's life.

This book was a quick read and I enjoyed it. Characters Clemintine/Jane and Kerigan are well rounded and have good chemistry that took time to evolve and wasn't insta love. The secondary characters in this book helped to add dimension. I enjoyed the memory struggle that Clementine went through and that she proved herself a female with a strong personality and convictions.

I honestly could tell by the writing of the first 2 chapters that it wouldn't be a good fit for our box and had to put it down. I may read it again in the future!

Interesting plot with a surprising twist that most students would enjoy reading. Likeable characters that teenagers and adults would really connect with. Interesting setting.

I love love love amnesia books, they’re one of my favourite things. I also love books set in Ireland so this sounded absolutely amazing. The premise seems really interesting – I’m also an avid watcher of MayDay or Air Crash Investigations as it’s known here and I find plane crashes in terms of who survives and who doesn’t sometimes really fascinating. Clementine is the sole survivor of a plane crash near Shannon Airport in County Limerick and she wakes in hospital with no recollection of the plane crash or why she was even travelling to Ireland in the first place as she’s from Ohio. When her friendly nurse tells her that her father has arrived to see her, Clementine panics because she doesn’t want to hurt a man she can’t even remember with that fact and so she bails, convincing a stranger to take her away from the hospital.

And this is around the time I began to sort of struggle with this and considering that’s quite early in the story, I figured I was not going to love this. Clementine is a young woman in a vulnerable position, I get that. She’s supposed to be disoriented and terrified but she should’ve been seeking answers, not running from those who could provide them. Her reasons for leaving the hospital are pretty weak and the young man that takes her away, Keiran, probably has an even worse reason for doing what she requests are even worse. She’s the sole survivor of a plane crash, you’d think there’d be quite a lot of people wanting to speak to her, the NTSB first on the list but forget about that because the plane crash isn’t actually important and is rarely mentioned again and no one cares about why it crashed or anything else.

The romance would’ve had to have been pretty good to make me forget the practicalities of being the only survivor in a plane crash not that far from a major airport in a country that has a good aviation safety record and was carrying passengers from America, a country that has probably the best aviation investigation squad. Keiran is a reluctant rich kid, who finds that the perks of Daddy’s money don’t pay off when it means that you have to live your life as Daddy wishes. He’s staying in a country house with his sister and although he regularly disappears in the morning, he leaves Clementine (calling herself Jane, as she can’t identify with Clementine) money in order to purchase necessities as Clementine has spun some story about why she doesn’t have any belongings or money.

Holes, holes everywhere I’m afraid. Jane’s story is not remotely convincing and whilst I’m aware that everyone is a stranger to Clementine, running off from the hospital days after you survived a plane crash (with apparently no injuries other than the amnesia…) is really not the wisest decision to make. Also she didn’t want to hurt her father by not recognising him or not feeling any love for him or anything like that but she completely ignores what disappearing might do to her father, who almost lost his only child once. Surely actually having Clementine’s physical presence, even if mentally she is absent, would be much more comforting than having her vanish from the hospital with a potentially serious medical condition, no money, no knowledge of the country, nothing. I’m honestly not sure what Clementine hoped to accomplish from her flight. She says something about waiting ‘two weeks’ but this seemed some sort of ridiculously random attempt to pacify herself that what she’d done was okay.

I didn’t like Keiran much in the beginning and I’m afraid my dislike for him only grew as I got deeper into the story and more and more about him was revealed, which explains why he buys “Jane’s” dodgy story. He didn’t seem charming and although he seems oddly kind at first, I ended up feeling quite uncomfortable about his actions by the end of the book. They were really controlling, even though it’s wrapped up in his laid back, nice guy persona there’s no doubt that he knew exactly the sorts of things he was doing and it could’ve gone very, very wrong. In fact I think it’s poor writing that one part of what Keiran does is glossed over like it’s no big deal when it’s actually a huge deal. I was lukewarm on him before that but I really ended up disliking him. Actually I didn’t like Clementine that much either. The best characters were the minor characters of Clive and Keiran’s prickly sister Siobahn.

This had a promising premise but overall I just felt that the execution wasn’t up to what I was expecting. The romance wasn’t anywhere near enough for me – I never really felt a connection between Clementine and Keiran and I feel as though it will only be more problematic when Clementine properly recalls everything. Grief is not something that you can forget or skip, even if things didn’t turn out the way someone planned. I actually feel like a lot of this storyline made things so much worse for Clementine and others. I think I would’ve enjoyed this more if, she had to run away, that she did it on her own, without really needing Keiran around to provide for her and for her to cling to. He’s hiding a lot of secrets and I don’t think he was entirely acting out of kindness in the end. It may have developed into something like that but with all the info, looking back makes his appearance and actions seem a bit creepy.

5/10

When I first saw the cover and blurb for The Upside Of Falling Down, I was only expecting a cute and light coming of age story.
It was so much more than that.

Clementine/Jane's story resonated with me in a special way I wish I could express. As Kieran likes to say, she's a strong girl; that doesn't mean she doesn't have moments of weakness though and that matters a lot.

I'm quick to find romance unnecessary but this one felt right to me. It didn't feel forced and it didn't take the attention away from what the book is really about: the heroine's journey through fear and truth.

Of course the amazing setting of Ireland also helps. Maybe I'm biased because I feel a personnal connection to the country but I loved the choice of scenery, it's a nice change for the typical US setting.

No spoilers involved, I'd just like to finish by saying that this book contains one of the very few plot twists that managed to make me say "holy shit" out loud since I read We Were Liars last year, so there's also that going for it.

Light, easy, and cute read.

What I can’t get over about this book is that it teaches that you might discover wonderful things if you stop fighting against fear and embrace it, hence the title The Upside of Falling Down. The author enlightens and tells readers that memory loss affects you in more ways than you can imagine. Even everyday conversations are inescapably tied to your identity. Some things apparently can’t be wiped clean even after you lose your memory.

I mainly requested this book to review so that I could read an ‘outsider’ perspective of Ireland, which is always interesting! Paired with the hook of the concept of the book, Clementine being the sole survivor of a plane crash and then having to rediscover herself, I was looking forward to reviewing it.

Literature and pop culture is of course littered with inaccuracies relating to Ireland, not to mention an over-romanticisation of an already beautiful country, the ‘old homeland.’ I was more than happy therefore to read Rebekah Crane’s take on Ireland, as it steers away from cliche, even slyly mentioning twee Irishisms like leprechauns and the Blarney Stone.

It was refreshing to read instead the strange little quirks as observed by Rebekah Crane, the quirks that make up modern Ireland. Things like a fondness for Murphy’s stout rather than Guinness in the south of the country, and an obsession with soaps like Home and Away and Coronation Street, really tickled me.

Clementine’s story is a great jumping-off point for a story. She knows hardly anything about herself and we are of course in the same situation. It brings us gently into her new reality, where every new person she meets becomes a major character, purely because she knows nobody else. She does know, however, to act on instinct and getting away from media attention at the hospital and scarpering to Waterville with the help of Good Samaritan Kieran is a key early plot point.

This brings in some well-developed characters. Along with Kieran who has his own demons to escape from, we are introduced to his sister Siobhan and their friend Clive. All four of these characters have their own arcs within the plot and are all engaging to read about.

Summer in Waterville is portrayed really well. It’s beautiful, but it does rain incessantly, there’s a lot of Americans around and everyone is there to play golf. It really does show that the author has spent time in Ireland on several occasions and the attention to authenticity is appreciated by this Irish reader.

Clementine inevitably has to face up to her ‘old’ life at some stage as she begins to experience flashbacks of her life before the crash. The plot drives on from here and makes it an enjoyable story. To go into much further detail would spoil the plot, but it does involve a trip to other locations in Ireland and more planes!

Out January 2018
https://derekcarneyhasathingforbooks.wordpress.com/2017/12/29/the-upside-of-falling-down-by-rebekah-crane-ya/

This was one of those books that caught my attention at first by the synopsis along with the first couple pages yet ultimately could not get into it. I do however love Rebekah Crane's other book The Odds of Loving Grover Cleveland but I think the subject of this one wasn't fully what I expected and wasn't a topic that interested me in the end.