Fracture -- Megan Miranda
Seventeen-year-old Delany Maxwell shouldn't have lived after falling through the ice.
Actually, she didn't.
She was underwater eleven minutes. Coming back after that much time without oxygen is pretty much unheard of. But her best friend, Decker Phillips, refused to stop CPR while waiting for the ambulance, and somehow, the doctors brought her back.
When she wakes up after a brief coma, she seems mostly unchanged: the doctors are shocked that she hasn't suffered massive brain damage. Truth be told, her brain scans are a little bit weird, and she's suffering occasional seizures and hand tremors, but all things considered, she's doing pretty well.
Except that her seizures and tremors are coupled with something else that she hasn't been able to explain to anyone else. A feeling—a weird tugging, an itch in her brain—that draws her towards people who are dying.
And then she meets a mysterious boy who has the same power...
Pros: Although the synopsis makes it sound like forty bazillion other paranormals, Fracture is different. Yes, yes, Delaney is attracted to Troy (the mysterious dude), and yes, yes, there's a push-and-pull-and-push between her, Decker, and Troy. But it's not the same-old-same-old love triangle that we've come to expect in paranormals. The dynamics are different, and it's less about lurrrve and hormones and more about power, choice, and survival. The other issues that Delaney grapples with are more mundane—reintegrating into school and home as That Girl Who Died, her mother's new hyper-protective nature, the fact that she accidentally made out with her most obnoxious male friend (not Decker) shortly before the accident—and it reads more like a contemporary with paranormal (or sci-fi, if you prefer to look at it that way) elements than like a straight paranormal.
It's got some genuinely creepy moments, and rather than Bella's Edward Cullen Hurts Me Because He Loves Me routine, Delaney's reasons for not cutting Troy loose early on are easy (or, they were for me) to identify with: she's trying to understand this power she suddenly has, and what she's supposed to do with it. Well, that and the blackmail thing, but that comes later.
Cons: Two things, other but both are completely personal. First, we're told (by Delaney) that Fracture takes place in Northern Maine, but nothing about the setting really feels specifically like Maine. It could be any generic cold-winter place. (See Carrie Jones or, of course, Stephen King, for capturing the Maine feel.) Second, I think I've read a few too many girl-with-a-male-best-friend-who's-in-love-with-her-and-by-the-time-she-realizes-that-she-reciprocates-it-might-be-too-late stories.
Recommended to: I'd steer it towards fans of the darker paranormals, like the Wake trilogy, but fans of YA forensic/medical mysteries (like the Cameryn Mahoney series) might dig it, too.
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Amazon | Indiebound.
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Book source: ILLed through my library.