Three Wishes

On a bitterly cold October evening, a truck skids across icy roads into a car that slides uncontrollably into pedestrian Bree Miller. The driver, Tom Gates, spends days helping the woman recover both at the hospital and later at her home. As they fall in love, Bree eventually tells Tom about her near-death, out-of-body experience and her recollection that she has been granted three wishes by the Being of Light she met during the episode. Once the three wishes are granted, she feels that she will die once more. Bree uses one wish as a test but the result is ambiguous, so she can't be sure if it is luck or the true power of the granted wish. It is only after her death that Tom has the hindsight to see that Bree's three wishes had been granted. Delinsky draws detailed portraits of her characters, from physical attributes to personalities. The picture-perfect, small-town Vermont setting is effectively drawn. The mystery of Bree's mother's identity adds another layer to the intriguing plot.