If I Stay by Gayle Forman 
Published 2009 by Dutton Books An Imprint of Penguin Books (USA)

I would consider this book genre to be Drama/Realistic Fiction. The context of If I Stay is present day, and it talks about how her getting in the car crash early on in the book, and then her in the hospital having an out-of-body experience, while in a coma.
On a snowy winter’s day in Northern West Coast of the United States, Mia and her family are taking a trip to see her grandparents. All four of her family members are in the car, Teddy, her younger brother, her mom, and her dad. All of a sudden they came around a blind corner and an eighteen wheeler drove right into them. She immediately wakes up and realizes when all the ambulances and cop cars are there, that something had happened. All she remembers is driving and listening to her favorite classical music on the radio. She realizes that something isn’t right when she walks over to a figure in the snow, and realizes it’s her body that all of the paramedics are tending too. She follows the paramedics to the hospital still not knowing about any of her family members, she just wants to stay with her body. Once at the hospital, she’s a bit frazzled wondering about her family where they are and if they are still even alive. She also worries about her love interest in the book, Adam, who she loves dearly, and he has the same feelings for her.
Once Adam knows about Mia and what happened that morning, Adam rushes to the hospital where she is and demands to come through the doors of the ICU, but the nurses stop him because he’s not a family member. Anyway things play on and he keeps trying to think of a plan with Mia’s best girlfriend, Kim on how to get in without any of the nurses knowing. A classic love story is told with the boyfriend tearing his heart out trying to reach his girlfriend, more than that, the love of his life, and wondering if he’s going to make it in time in case she dies, he wouldn’t even be able to say good bye. While he is doing this, Mia is in the ICU contemplating whether she should stay or stop fighting to stay alive and just peacefully stop breathing. There was a time where all she needed to hear from somebody was that she could go, she had the permission, and that’s exactly what her grandfather said to her. That it was OK if she wanted to go, no one would blame her. The only thing keeping her going was Adam and that she hadn’t seen him yet, They had to see each other, for their own satisfactions.
Finally Adam gets in with Kim, with the help of Willow who is a nurse at the hospital, and a family friend of Mia’s family. Kim visited first, but then it was Adam’s turn, all he said was “Stay” and the tone of his voice made her fall in love all over again. He tells her that if she stays he will do whatever she wants him to do, whether it would be easier for her to let him go, and just go back to her normal regular life, and erase the people she already knows. He said for her he’ll do anything, he would let Mia go, if she would just stay. In the end after not hearing anything or feeling anything, it ends with Mia feeling his touch for the first time since the coma, and her hearing him, and not just reading his lips, or hearing him as an echo, but really truly hearing him.
I thought the book was very well written, as a love story and drama, making Mia and Adam’s love really come through the pages, with descriptions, and a great imagery. It really painted a picture of the car crash scene, and then Adam rushing through the hospital trying to find Mia, on all the different floors. I would think the theme of If I Stay would be sacrifice, meaning so much for this story. Sacrifice of love, sacrifice of if she wants to stay alive or not, so many sacrifices throughout the story, for themselves or for others.
I really liked how the author wrote flashbacks into the story, made it very intriguing to read not just one whole story. So all in all it was a great book, very well written, and a perfect love story I wanted to read about, great author, great book.