If You Find Me is a book about so much more than two girls rescued from the woods. It is a tale of endurance, mistrust, loyalty, love and most of all family.

Carey and her sister Jenessa have been abandoned by their neglectful mother and they are stranded in the woods, living off their last cans of beans. They are not even living; simply surviving. However two people approach their camp that will change both their lives forever. Nevertheless Carey still cannot be free from the marks the wood left on her. She is hiding something, something big, something that could set her free or spiral her to into disaster.

This book was so powerful I read it from front to back in one night. Almost everything in this book works beautifully. Carey's strong point of view and personality drives the book; Murdoch clearly gets the reader to connect with Carey and her sister through just the first pages, and from then on guides you on the roller coaster ride of their lives. Her sisterly love tore at my heart strings and the lyrical writing through dialect complements each character, subtly reminding you of their state. Suspense is kept running through the book with the secret of her past that haunts her in everyday life and the sadness this brings her is balanced out by hopefulness: Carey and Ness realising they have a whole new life ahead of them.

As with all books it still has its problems, however it is easily overshadowed by the great plot and writing. This book ends much too neatly. It's as if Murdoch tied the bow and felt complete. I believe with a book of this sort it is unrealistic to have a happy ending of this measure, however if you are a fan of the eternal "happy ever after" you will not be disappointed, while the more pessimistic will question the ending.

Although there is no doubt that this heartbreakingly magnificent story about a girl and her sister fighting against the world, finding love where they never thought it existed and finally living life has borrowed itself into my heart and is never leaving.

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