{ARC Review} Fracture by Megan Miranda

Title: Fracture
Author: Megan Miranda
Publisher: Walker and Company (Bloomsbury Children's Books)
Source: NetGalley
Release Date: January 17, 2012

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Synopsis:

Eleven minutes passed before Delaney Maxwell was pulled from the icy waters of a Maine lake by her best friend Decker Phillips. By then her heart had stopped beating. Her brain had stopped working. She was dead. And yet she somehow defied medical precedent to come back seemingly fine—despite the scans that showed significant brain damage. Everyone wants Delaney to be all right, but she knows she's far from normal. Pulled by strange sensations she can't control or explain, Delaney finds herself drawn to the dying. Is her altered brain now predicting death, or causing it?

Then Delaney meets Troy Varga, who recently emerged from a coma with similar abilities. At first she's reassured to find someone who understands the strangeness of her new existence, but Delaney soon discovers that Troy's motives aren't quite what she thought. Is their gift a miracle, a freak of nature-or something much more frightening?

For fans of best-sellers like Before I Fall and If I Stay, this is a fascinating and heart-rending story about love and friendship and the fine line between life and death.

Let's start by saying that I absolutely love this cover. It's not just a pretty picture or generic cover, it's prophetic. It says everything about Fracture. I would recommend getting this one in print, the cover alone is worth it...not to mention how amazing the story is. 

So now that I've covered the cover, let's talk about the writing. This is another one of those hauntingly beautiful love stories that weave their way into your heart and head, refusing to let go. Megan is a master at description, bringing the settings to life in a way very few authors have the can. Fracture is told in first person from Delaney's terrifying point of view, captivating you on her shocking adventure through life and death, then the return to life. You feel every bit of her fear, heart-ache, loss, pain, hurt, and betrayal as if it were your own.

Delaney spends eleven minutes submerged below ice only to awaken in a hospital room surrounded by doctor's who say she has no chance. She spends several days trapped inside her body, listening and feeling things around her, unable to let people know her brain is working. Finally breaking free, she finds that her best friend, Decker, has been by her side the entire time. Unsure of what this means, all she wants is to leave the hospital and prove to everyone that she is the same Delaney she was before the accident. This will be difficult to prove since she can literally feel the dead pulling her to and fro.

Let's count the reasons I love this book

#1 - Delaney faces repetitive loss...from her own, to her mother's withdrawal, to the friend she couldn't save. It's not always a deathly loss but so many things go tragically wrong that people around her disappear from her life, leaving her alone and unable to cope. She must continue to fight for her life even after she's survived a horrific drowning. Evil lurks all around her, always attempting to sway her but Delaney is a fighter and she is most definitely a survivor.

#2 - Decker and Delaney have been friends for what must seem like an eternity but now their friendship is strained. Delaney's accident has attracted the attention of Troy...someone who knows what it feels like to survive an unsurvivable accident. Decker walks a fine line...always wanting more than friendship and always afraid more will send Delaney straight into the arms of someone else.

#3 - The taboo subject of euthanasia. Troy believes that people who are dying should be put out of their misery. Of course, he doesn't ask their opinions...he takes matters into his own hands. Delaney is out to prove him wrong and stop him from his current course of action.

#4 - The serious twist of fate and Delaney's epiphany. I cannot go into this without spoiling the book so...

#5 - Fracture brings so many feelings bubbling to the surface that leaves you thinking for days. I can't imagine a more heart-felt and life-altering story.

*I was provided a free uncorrected ebook via NetGalley and Bloomsbury Children's Books in return for my honest review.