If I Stay Gayle Forman Published by Doubleday ISBN 978 0 385 61620 1
This is a story of a teenage girl who hovers between life and death after a car crash.
Mia, 17, is surrounded by a loving family and everything that goes with it. One day, school is cancelled because of snow and her family have an unexpected day's holiday.
The road near their house is reasonably free of snow and ice, so the family get into the car to visit friends. But the driver of an oncoming truck loses control on the icy road and crashes into them.
Mia's parents are killed and her brother is thrown from the car. Mia survives with her life hanging in the balance.
She watches, standing over her body as hospital doctors fight to save her. From here, If I Stay could easily have swung into supernatural mode, but Forman narrates a more captivating story.
