Elsewhere

by Gabrielle Zevin

Book Overview

Is it possible to grow up while getting younger? Welcome to Elsewhere. It is warm, with a breeze, and the beaches are marvelous. It's quiet and peaceful. You can't get sick or any older. Curious to see new paintings by Picasso? Swing by one of Elsewhere's museums. Need to talk to someone about your problems? Stop by Marilyn Monroe's psychiatric practice. Elsewhere is where fifteen-year-old Liz Hall ends up, after she has died. It is a place so like...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0374320918
• ISBN13: 9780374320911
• Release Date: September 2005
• Publisher: Farrar Straus Giroux
• Length: 275 Pages
• Weight: 0.97 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 5.9" x 8.3"
• Age Range: 12 to 17 years
• Grade Range: Grades 7 to 12

Customer Reviews

This was an amazing book!

I was hooked from the moment I opened it. I read this because I’ve read the books The Everafter and I felt like they connected even though they’re not related at all. I was really happy with this book and I’ll be checking more out by this author.

It’s fine.

I read this book in middle school and I absolutely loved it, I still feel very nostalgic about it. Rereading it as an adult was 100% a mistake. The entire time I was reading all I could think about was how all the characters seemed to speak with the same voice, very few of the characters were really fleshed out (they all seem to be solely motivated by helping Liz and have almost no personality outside of that), and the whole book felt more like a pitch for a TV show or movie. The concept of the afterlife presented in Elsewhere is interesting and has a lot of potential, but the author uses it mostly to name drop famous dead people. Overall, it’s not a terrible book, but it’s definitely not for anyone outside of its target audience, would not recommend buying/reading this unless you are buying for a middle schooler or are one yourself.

I read this book every year

I love everything about this book. The perspective on life never gets old. Great read for anyone.

A nice perspective on the afterlife.

Elsewhere tells of a place that is not quite heaven, but where the deceased can continue their life, finding more love and friendship just as they did on Earth. This book was very touching and reminds you that it is the quality of life, and not the quantity that stays with you.

I love this book !

This is such a great book. It really help put me somewhere else. Like I walked through the book with Liz ! They just depicted everything so well. I had to buy it so I could read it again & own it ! This is an Awesome book

I've loved this book since I was a teenager!

It takes you to another place! The book makes you think about the afterlife in a different manner. It was beautifully written! Im now getting it for my teenage daughter, after I read it again of course!

Ordered the paperback, recieved the CD audio books.

I loved reading this book as a teenager and I would love to read again! Unfortunately I received the audio CDs instead of the paperback. This book had an amazing story about the afterlife. Something that has stuck with me since reading it as a teen.

Waking Up Dead

Liz Hall wakes up dead one morning. That's definitely not the way to start off the day. At first, she thinks it's all a dream, but then she remembers being hit by a car. The realization sets in that she'll never fall in love, never get her driver's license, and never see her family again. She spends her days on the observation deck where passengers can peek into the lives of their loved ones still alive. It takes Liz's dead grandmother to show Liz that death is worth living and that it's possible to have all the things she thought she'd lost even if she's going to have to live her life backwards. A great young adult and older story about living life (or death) to the fullest.

Field Trip to Elsewhere

An original concept, even post Lovely Bones. Unlike Turnabout by Haddix, where the elderly chose to live backwards in time, Liz, fifteen, almost sixteen, has died and been sent to Elsewhere to live death in reverse until she can be reborn. And she's not too happy about it. Touching, funny, and a great discussion book. This little gem of a read offers a new light in the life after death genre that is so trendy these days.

If you read nothing else READ THIS BOOK !!!

I believe this to be one of the best books I have ever read. I absolutely loved this book. Lizzie is killed in a hit and run accident and Elsewhere is the story of her ' afterlife '. I don't wish to write any more than that because this book is an absolute must- read. To tell more of the story would be to spoil a book that will really challenge your beliefs and perspective about life after death. No-one really knows what happens after death. Each reader will bring their own personal philosophy to Zevin's story, but what became apparent as I progressed through the book was that if life after death was like the Elsewhere of the story, human beings would fear death less and learn to appreciate wherever they are in their stage of development in-life and after-life. Zevin has taken such an everyday concept, turned it on its head and written what can only be described as a convincing believable story about where we go and what happens to everyone when they die. The tone is hopeful, the prose realistic and beautiful. The ending is utterly perfect. The story is infused with life lessons and gentle morals without being sanctimonious in the least. In some ways I find it hard to say all that I really feel about this book, that my words will not do justice to the story. Zevin has left no stone unturned. Her tale covers: what happens to animals, how you progress to the ' afterlife,' how you make contact with life on earth, and how you become reborn, amongst many other questions people have about ' what happens when you die ?'. The story is in no way contrived but highly plausible. I found myself crying consistently on and off throughout the story, not because it was sad, but because it was so buoyant and made so much sense about dealing with what is almost always a disagreeable topic. Elsewhere is a book that good readers of 13 and above would enjoy. It poses so many philosophical questions and ideas that would be excellent for use in a " Gifted and Talented " class. The idea of getting younger as opposed to getting older would be an excellent starting point for some creative writing. Students often want to get older quickly before they've had chance to experience being young, so the possibility of becoming younger and debating what happens at the point of birth could open up some amazing philosophical discussion. In short this book is brilliant. If you read nothing else for the rest of the year, read this.

Stunning

I went to the book store the other day, and I was picking and choosing my way through the YA section when this one caught my eye. Glancing at the cover, it didn't look too much different from the others on the New Reads shelf, but one glance inside and I realized how special this book is. Right in the store, I read the first few pages, making sure it wasn't another frothy, badly written popularity-and-such book. And it wasn't. I practically threw away the book I had specifically come to buy, and spent the entire night reading this instead. As someone else has already mentioned, I started crying near the end, and continued to do so for about ten minutes afterward. This book touches a nerve somewhere deep down, where we all wonder about death, life, and love. (And in case you're wondering, I've only cried at one book before, and no movies ever, so this is a big deal) This book is unassuming at first glance, but reading it made me think about the big things that I think we all wonder about, the things that book should be about. I am pleased that somebody still knows that YA books don't have to be trashy-teen-movie style. Read this book, it's fabulous.

Breathtaking

Welcome to Elsewhere, where life simultaneously has ended and is beginning all at the same time. After an unfortunate (in more ways than one) collision with a taxi cab, Elizabeth M. Hall (please call her Liz!) finds herself on a cruise ship filled with very elderly people, save for her 16 year old roomate Thandiwe (please call her Thandie!) and a famous blue eyed and blue haired rocker named Curtis. Together, they discover that they are dead and are headed to a land that everyone goes to live until they are reborn to live again on Earth. The world is strangely concrete. Beyond the fact that no one is born and no one dies, it is strangely familiar - of course with some exceptions. (There are ways to watch the living, you take a job though you don't really need the money, you can fall in love but the (lack of) aging process means disparities in age are common...) Over time they all learn to live (or die?), and somehow simultaneously become more mature for these experiences while becoming younger biologically. I had no idea this book was geared towards young adults when I read it, and am happy to report it is well suited to adults. After reading the description I thought it would be a version of the Lovely Bones, but despite the fact that in both books the narrator is a deceased female teenager, they are quite disparate in tone. It's simulataneously comical, sad, hopeful and romantic, and the exercise your imagination will get trying to imagine some of the scenes is worth the price of admission all on it's own.