Miracle by Elizabeth Scott

Standalone. Simon Pulse (June 2012) Library

I sat there and wondered again why I'd lived. Why I didn't even feel like I was here.

Megan is a miracle. At least, that's what everyone says. Having survived a plane crash that killed everyone else on board, Megan knows she should be grateful just to be alive. The truth is, she doesn't feel like a miracle.

In fact, she doesn't feel anything at all.

Then memories from the crash start coming back. Scared and alone, Megan doesn't know whom to turn to. Her entire community seem unable-or maybe unwilling-to see her as anything but Miracle Megan, except maybe Joe, the beautiful boy next door with a tragic past and secrets of his own. 

All Megan wants is for her life to get back to normal, but the harder she tries to live up to everyone's expectations, the worse she feels. This time she may be falling too fast to be saved....

Ever since Megan came back alive from the crash of flight 619 no one really sees her as Megan anymore. She's the miracle girl. The girl who lived when everyone else died. She's the girl everyone stares at, smiles at without really looking at her. Because if they did look closely enough they would see her slowly retreat in herself. They would see that she is slowly becoming nothing more than a hollow shell that is desperate for someone to notice that something is wrong with her. But her parents pretend, her friends pretend, the whole community pretends because if she isn't the miracle girl what is she? The broken girl? The lost girl? The girl who doesn't care or feel anything at all?

Megan lied to the world and herself when she said she remembered the crash. She felt like she had to do that to get home and get back to normal - to get away from her parents nervous, anxious smiles. But, it wasn't the truth. The truth of the matter is that she remembers nothing from the crash. But, over time flashes of memories come back to her and haunt her. The sky is ablaze with fire when she least expects it. The only people who really notice are her brother who now hates her because she gets all the attention, Margaret an old lady who works at the church, and the beautiful boy next door who has his own tragedy to deal with. Megan must find her way through that night when the sky was on fire because if she doesn't it might be the only thing that defines her.

If you plan to read this book I must warn you that you will CRY. YOUR. EYES. OUT. For someone like me who cries whenever something goes wrong in the characters she reads life this was the ultimate sob fest. It was intense, somewhat disturbing, and really powerful. This book struck a chord with me. I stayed up all night reading it, my mind refusing to stop until I got to the very end. Then and only then I could rest. It had me on edge and made me feel so much of what Megan was feeling - the feeling of being alone and no one noticing her very real crash of her own.

There was a lot of pretending in this book. Her parents especially would always pretend nothing was wrong. That everything is fine. Of course it was the complete opposite of that but I somehow understand where they were coming from. I've seen adults and I have even tried to pretend things away. But, by doing that they were only making everything worse. When things really hit the fan it was insane. I give a lot of blame to her parents and a lot of adults around her. It's just really sad the way she was feeling and the way no one got that she needed help.

Margaret and Joe were some of the only ones who noticed her. Margaret is this grandmotherly type who's seen some battles of her own and Joe is the next door neighbor that all the girls swoon at. Now before you roll your eyes he wasn't presented in that bad of a way. He was actually very likable. I thought after reading the summary that he was going to be my big problem with the book but no. The author really did well writing a very intense and hopeful book. The whole story was completely amazing and I'm happy to have read it. It's one of those books that stays with you for a long time.

Overall: Although this book kind of reinforced my fear of flying it was absolutely amazing and worth reading. A beautiful story.

This is the third book I've read by Elizabeth Scott and won't be my last. Here's another I plan to read that you might like - The Unwritten Rule.